Patent ID: 8268562

Claim:
A method of predicting an increased likelihood of response of a human patient with esophageal cancer to radiochemotherapy and subsequent esophagectomy, wherein the radiochemotherapy comprises radiation in conjunction with cisplatin, 5-fluorouracil and/or paciltaxtel, comprising: obtaining a sample from the human patient with esophageal cancer; detecting in the sample the presence of a cytosine at the polymorphic position of rs4954256 and the presence of a guanine at the polymorphic position of rs16863886; and predicting the human patient with the cytosine at the polymorphic position of rs4954256 and/or the guanine at the polymorphic position of rs16863886 has an increased likelihood of responding to radiochemotherapy and subsequent esophagectomy than a subject without the cytosine at the polymorphic position of rs4954256 and/or the guanine at the polymorphic position of rs16863886.