Targeted approaches to childhood cancer: progress in drug discovery and development

Abstract

Introduction: Cancer is a leading cause of death in childhood. Encouraging progress has been made in the treatment of childhood malignancies, but there is an unmet need for new drugs to improve survival and reduce treatment-associated toxicities. Drug development in paediatric oncology has specific requirements with regard to the patient population and the regulatory background and presents several unique challenges that need addressing.

Areas covered: This review discusses the current framework of paediatric oncology drug development and some of the specific challenges in pre-clinical and clinical research. The authors discuss the recent developments in the targeting of various signalling pathways. These pathways represent a selection of targets that have been identified by pre-clinical and clinical investigators to be highly relevant in paediatric malignancies.

Expert opinion: The development of targeted agents in paediatric oncology must be driven by knowledge of tumour biology. Predictive and pharmacodynamic biomarkers should be incorporated within paediatric early clinical trials wherever possible. Faster dose-escalation, limited numbers of cohorts and novel adaptive designs can help to make paediatric early clinical trials more efficient. Close collaboration between academic/clinical researchers, the pharmaceutical industry, regulatory bodies and parent groups are crucial in overcoming the challenges associated with paediatric oncology drug development.

Keywords:

• drug development
• oncology
• paediatric
• targeted therapy

Declaration of interest

L Moreno and LV Marshall are funded by the Oak Foundation. ADJ Pearson is supported by Cancer Research UK (programme grant C1178/A10294)—Chair in Paediatric Oncology. L Moreno is a consultant/advisory board member for Astra Zeneca, Novartis, and Roche Genentech. The authors have no other relevant affiliations or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript apart from those disclosed.

Notes

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