Exploring the impact of NGS on diagnostics and treatment of sarcoma: insights from real-world data across multiple institutions in Europe.
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BACKGROUND: Sarcomas comprise a heterogeneous group of malignant tumors of mesenchymal origin where diagnosis plays a crucial role in tailoring disease management and treatment. In this context, there is a lack of data assessing the potential benefit of next-generation sequencing (NGS) reflecting real-world scenarios across different countries. The aim of our analysis includes both the diagnostic refinement and the therapeutic guidance with the use of NGS in sarcoma treatment strategy. MATERIALS AND METHODS: We retrospectively analyzed 694 samples from six sarcoma-expert institutions from three countries in Europe: Greece, Poland, and Spain, thus reflecting a variety of scenarios. RESULTS: We identified 90 different sarcoma histological subtypes, of which the most common were leiomyosarcomas (10.1%), Ewing sarcomas (7.5%), and undifferentiated pleomorphic sarcomas (7.3%). In 62 patients (8.9%), using NGS fusion panels specific for diagnosis resulted in a change in the diagnosis. From a therapeutic perspective, NGS panels used for this purpose were suitable to identify single-nucleotide variants and copy number alterations. The most common alterations were mutations that mostly occurred in TP53, followed by RB1, PIK3CA, CDKN2A, CTNNB1, IDH1, NF1, CHECK2, PTEN, BRCA1, and BRCA2. One hundred and thirty-five alterations (19.5%) were actionable according to OncoKB, while four additional alterations (0.6%) were actionable in disagreement with OncoKB. CONCLUSIONS: In conclusion, our data support the clinical utility of NGS fusion panels in diagnosing sarcomas in specific contexts. The therapeutic value of NGS remains limited, as reported before. However, given the overall paucity of molecular data for most sarcoma subtypes, we emphasize the importance of an international effort to collect molecular profiling of sarcomas to guide the design of clinical trials for specific targetable alterations.