The following is a summary of “Evaluating Real World Mutational Differences Between Hispanics and Asians in NSCLC at a Large Academic Institution in Los Angeles” published in the November 2022 issue of Clinical Lung Cancer by Hsu et al.
The outcomes for Hispanic patients vary, despite the frequency being higher than it is for Asian patients in the United States. Here, researchers compared the mutational characteristics of Asian and Hispanic residents of Los Angeles. From July 2017 to August 2020, 393 non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients who were given comprehensive genomic profiling (CGP) at the Los Angeles County + University of Southern California (LAC + USC) Medical Center and Norris Comprehensive Cancer Center were studied. Tissue samples (n=211) from Caris Life Sciences and liquid biopsies (231 from Guardant Health) were used for CGP. In addition, Hispanics and Asians were compared using multivariate logistic regression to determine the significance of racial factors.
In the Hispanic cohort (n=90), 50.0% were male, the median age at diagnosis was 62, 54.5% were non-smokers, and 85.5% had adenocarcinoma. The majority of Asians (n=142) were nonsmokers (59.6%), diagnosed at a median age of 65, and were male (47.5%). Kirsten rat sarcoma virus (KRAS) mutations were more common in Hispanic patients (odds ratio [OR] 4.42, 95% CI [95% CI]: 1.63-12.83), but EGFR mutations were less common (OR 0.31, 95% CI [95% CI]: 0.16-0.59). KRAS mutations were found in a higher percentage of Hispanic smokers (14/41, or 34.1%) than in Asian smokers (4/58, or 6.9%).
KRAS mutations were more common among Hispanics than smokers of any other ethnicity, and EGFR mutations were more common among Asians than any other group. This research demonstrates that variations in the mutation frequency of NSCLC exist between ethnic groups because of differences in the impact of potentially carcinogenic exposures, which are in turn influenced by the patients’ own ethnic and racial origins.
Source: sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1525730422001516
