Taking as reference tumour-specific somatic genetic alterations identified within individual cancer biopsies from patients, recent advances in genomic and next generation sequencing technologies now provide the opportunity to investigate whether each patient's tumour-specific DNA can be reliably detected within their plasma. This offers the possibility to test a patient's response following treatment with curative intent. This technology has already been used to detect ctDNA in metastatic NSCLC, but not yet in early stage disease.~The primary objective of this pilot study is to test the feasibility of detecting serial ctDNA levels in stage I to IIIB NSCLC patients who undergo treatment with curative intent. As secondary endpoints, this study aims to measure ctDNA levels and characteristics, and to correlate them with clinical features (such as burden of disease and treatment response) in order to test the value of ctDNA as a diagnostic, prognostic and predictive biomarker for patients with NSCLC.~100 patients planned for curative treatment (surgery or radical radiotherapy +/- chemotherapy) will be recruited.
This is a prospective observational pilot study to investigate levels of circulating tumour DNA (ctDNA) in plasma from patients with stage I to IIIB non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) who will undergo treatment with curative intent.