Niloofar Agharezaee - Department of Genetics, Faculty of Advanced Science and Technology, Tehran Medical Sciences, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran
Flora Forouzesh - Department of Genetics, Faculty of Advanced Science and Technology, Tehran Medical Sciences, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran

Introduction: Gastrointestinal cancers including colorectal, liver, gastric and esophageal cancers are an increasing health problem throughout the world. Next Generation Sequencing (NGS) of cancer tissues is progressively being carried out to identify somatic genomic alterations that may guide physicians to make therapeutic results. Treating tumors based on mutational profiles has shown to be a feasible option in multiple solid tumor studies, and this approach is being progressively incorporated in clinical practice. Recent application of large-scale NGS technology to gastrointestinal cancer has helped better define the complex genomic landscape of these cancers. NGS technologies in human diseases to encourage human social insurance and personalized medicine. The aim of this study was the review of the use of NGS in the analysis of gastrointestinal cancers.Methods: We reviewed 10 articles from 2015 to 2018 in this study. The articles were searched from NCBI, PubMed, and Google Scholar.Results: A single tissue biopsy may not reflect complete genomic architecture due to the heterogeneous nature of tumors. Circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) analysis is a robust noninvasive method to detect and monitor genomic alterations in blood in real time. Although ctDNA NGS analysis is becoming increasingly available commercially, there is the relative paucity of data regarding the extent of concordance between tumor tissue genomics and peripheral blood ctDNA, as well as regarding their respective roles in the context of overall patient management. Conclusion: As the cost of NGS continues to decline, in the near future whole genome sequencing, RNA sequencing and proteomics may become relatively predictable, adding further to the complexity of data explanation and implementation for equally academic and community oncologists. Recent NGS studies undoubtedly have provided a wealth of data that has better characterized the genomic landscape of gastrointestinal cancer.

Next generation sequencing, Personalized Medicine, Gastrointestinal Cancer