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Activity and safety of FOLFOX4 plus either cetuximab administered weekly or every second week were similar.

The European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO) and the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) are publishing a new edition of the ESMO/ASCO Global Curriculum (GC) thanks to contribution of 64 ESMO-appointed and 32 ASCO-appointed authors. First published in 2004 and updated in 2010, the GC edition 2016 answers to the need for updated recommendations for the training of physicians in medical oncology by defining the standard to be fulfilled to qualify as medical oncologists. At times of internationalisation of healthcare and increased mobility of patients and physicians, the GC aims to provide state-of-the-art cancer care to all patients wherever they live. Recent progress in the field of cancer research has indeed resulted in diagnostic and therapeutic innovations such as targeted therapies as a standard therapeutic approach or personalised cancer medicine apart from the revival of immunotherapy, requiring specialised training for medical oncology trainees. Thus, several new chapters on technical contents such as molecular pathology, translational research or molecular imaging and on conceptual attitudes towards human principles like genetic counselling or survivorship have been integrated in the GC. The GC edition 2016 consists of 12 sections with 17 subsections, 44 chapters and 35 subchapters, respectively. Besides renewal in its contents, the GC underwent a principal formal change taking into consideration modern didactic principles. It is presented in a template-based format that subcategorises the detailed outcome requirements into learning objectives, awareness, knowledge and skills. Consecutive steps will be those of harmonising and implementing teaching and assessment strategies.

Lung cancer is the most common cancer worldwide, accounting for over 1.37 million deaths annually. The clinical outcome and management of lung cancer patients could be substantially improved by the implementation of non-invasive biomarker assays for the early detection, prognosis as well as prediction and monitoring of treatment response. MicroRNAs (miRNAs) have been implicated in the regulation of virtually all signaling circuits within a cell and their dysregulation has been shown to play an essential role in the development and progression of cancer. Recently, miRNAs were found to be released into the circulation and to exist there in a remarkably stable form. Furthermore, various cancers were shown to leave specific miRNA fingerprints in the blood of patients suggesting that cell-free miRNAs could serve as non-invasive biomarkers for the detection or monitoring of cancer and putative therapeutic targets. Since that, a considerable effort has been devoted to decode the information carried by circulating miRNAs. In the current review, we give an insight into the mechanisms of miRNA release into the bloodstream, their putative functional significance and systematically review the studies focused on the identification of cell-free miRNAs with the diagnostic, prognostic, and predictive significance in lung cancer and discuss their potential clinical utility.