Prognostic impact of circulating tumor cells assessed with the CellSearch System™ and AdnaTest Breast™ in metastatic breast cancer patients: the DETECT study

摘要

IntroductionThere is a multitude of assays for the detection of circulating tumor cells (CTCs) but a very limited number of studies comparing the clinical relevance of results obtained with different test methods. The DETECT trial for metastatic breast cancer patients was designed to directly compare the prognostic impact of two commercially available CTC assays that are prominent representatives of immunocytochemical and RT-PCR based technologies.