Patent ID: 8568693

Claim:
A method to assist in the determination of the most suitable course of therapy for an individual patient previously diagnosed to be suffering from Barrett's oesophagus, said method comprising: (i) providing to said patient a first imaging agent which comprises a vector which selectively targets a protein marker chosen from one of (a) Her2, (b) cMet, (c) guanylyl cyclase C or (d) IGF1R, and an imaging moiety chosen from a radioisotope or an optical reporter; (ii) imaging at least a portion of the oesophagus of said patient with said first imaging agent from step (i); (iii) making a determination from the imaging of step (ii) whether there is increased uptake of the imaging agent relative to background at one or more locations of the patient's oesophagus; (iv) when the determination of step (iii) shows increased uptake, treating the patient based on the protein marker of the imaging agent used in step (ii): (a) for Her2, treatment with a drug or therapy which targets Her2; (b) for cMet, treatment with a drug or therapy which targets cMet; (c) for guanylyl cyclase C, treatment with a drug or therapy which targets guanylyl cyclase C; (d) for IGF1R, treatment with a drug or therapy which targets IGF1R; and (v) when no increased uptake is detected in step (iii), either a different therapy is given to said patient, or steps (iii)-(v) are repeated for said patient with a second imaging agent which comprises a different vector to that employed in step (ii); where the patient has already failed to respond to a first-line therapy from one or more of: anti-reflux medication, endoscopic mucosal ablation and surgical resection.