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Molecular Biology of Medulloblastoma: Will It Ever Make a Difference to Clinical Management?

  • Childhood Brain Tumors
  • Published:
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Summary

Over the last 10 years approximately 750 children with medulloblastoma have been treated on consortia based clinical trials at an estimated cost of over $150 million. Despite this enormous effort, no meaningful molecular data has been generated that will inform the next generation of clinical studies. It is imperative that the neuro-oncology community give greater priority to studies of medulloblastoma molecular biology: unless we do this our patients will face a bleak future in which there is no accurate disease-risk stratification tool and no effective new treatments. We review some of the reasons we have failed to translate knowledge of medulloblastoma disease biology to the clinic and look forward to the next generation of clinical and molecular studies that are seeking to correct this.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Departments of Developmental Neurobiology, St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, 332 North Lauderdale St., Memphis, TN, 38105, USA

    Richard J. Gilbertson

  2. Hematology/Oncology, St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, 38105, Memphis, TN, USA

    Richard J. Gilbertson & Amar Gajjar

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  1. Richard J. Gilbertson
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  2. Amar Gajjar
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Correspondence to Richard J. Gilbertson.

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Gilbertson, R.J., Gajjar, A. Molecular Biology of Medulloblastoma: Will It Ever Make a Difference to Clinical Management?. J Neurooncol 75, 273–278 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11060-005-6750-z

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