| Abstract [eng] |
Cholangiocarcinoma, also known as CCA, is a malignant tumour affecting the hepatobiliary system. Biliary cancer evolved over time to the second most commonly encountered type of liver cancer globally. Regardless diagnosis’ improvements and management that surfaced in the previous years, one can say that the sensitivity as well as the specificity of the existing diagnostic tools are still lacking, and the prognosis of the patients has not substantially ameliorated. Moreover, in the last 20 years the global mortality rates have been increasing, placing CCA as a worldwide uprising health problem. The mainstay potentially curative therapy is surgical resection with or without adjuvant therapy, yet most patients with CCA do not present at an early, but at an advanced stage, where those regimens show less efficacy than they do in earlier phases of this malignant disease. Chemotherapy is a mainstay treatment for advanced-stage CCA and the role of targeted therapy for those patients is currently being studied extensively. A potential solution to this problem could be the utilization of biomarkers that are able to detect CCA at an earlier time than nowadays used tests are able to. Considering the potential of DNA methylation or the use of the N-Nose test to diagnose cholangiocarcinoma according to its chemotaxis, opens up many different approaches on how to diagnose CCA. Through the use of specific biomarkers, one could be able to identify certain gene mutations that might result in malignant growth, leading to a possible earlier diagnosis and a consequent efficient treatment before cancer develops further. Furthermore, those biomarkers proved to be efficient in other malignant diseases as well, but since these markers are a rather new discovery, their exact mechanism and potential in the clinical setting must be further understood. Therefore, biomarker discovery and a better understanding of its potential for chemotherapy are pivotal to improving patients’ welfare and outcome. |
