Patent ID: 7507534

Claim:
A method for lung cancer therapy assessment comprising: (a) collecting a blood or pleural effusion sample from a human subject with lung cancer; (b) extracting total RNA of said sample; (c) amplifying a panel of gene transcripts of said total RNA by qPCR, wherein said panel of gene transcripts, named j, comprises keratin 19 (KRT19), ubiquitin thiolesterase (UCHL1), tripartite motif-containing 28 (TRIM28), and Highly similar to HSFIB1 for fibronectin; (d) measuring a qPCR threshold cycle number (C T ) j for each gene transcript of j in said panel of gene transcripts of said total RNA from said sample, and a qPCR threshold cycle number C T (GAPDH) for the control gene transcript of said total RNA from said sample; (e) calculating a differential expression ratio Q j for each gene transcript of j in said panel of gene transcripts of said total RNA according to Q j =2 (ΔC T ) j −(ΔC T ) j,mean wherein (ΔC T ) j =C T (GAPDH) −(C T ) j , and (ΔC T ) j, mean is a predetermined mean of (ΔC T ) j for gene transcript of j over a population of persons not inflicted with lung cancer; (f) calculating a normalized expression ratio E j for each gene transcript of j in said panel of gene transcripts of said total RNA according to E j =( Q j −Q j,mean )/σ j wherein Q j, mean is a predetermined mean of differential expression ratio for gene transcript of j over a population of lung cancer patients and σ j is a predetermined standard deviation of differential expression ratio for gene transcript of j over said population of lung cancer patients; (g) calculating a load of cancer cells (Lc) according to Lc=ΣE j , where the summation is over all the gene transcripts in said panel of gene transcripts; (h) administering a therapy for lung cancer to said human subject with lung cancer; (i) performing steps (a) to (g) to yield a load of cancer cells (Lc) for said human subject after said therapy for lung cancer; and (j) comparing said Lc before and after administering said therapy, wherein the therapy is determined to be effective if Lc after the therapy is less than a predetermined value, or is determined to be not effective if Lc after the therapy is not less than the predetermined value.