Exceptional Responders
The National Cancer Institute (NCI) has embarked on the Exceptional Responders (ER) Initiative to understand the molecular underpinnings of exceptional responses to treatment, primarily via chemotherapy, in cancer patients. Exceptional responders are patients who have a unique response to treatments that are not effective for most other patients. For this initiative, exceptional responders will be identified as patients enrolled in early-phase clinical trials in which fewer than 10 percent of the patients responded to the treatments being studied; patients who were treated with drugs not found to be generally effective for their disease; patients who were treated in later-phase clinical trials of single agents or combinations; and even patients who were treated with established therapies....