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Brain under pressure: the ultimate frontier?
23 octobre 2025
By Ana Espino | Published on October 23, 2025 | 3 min readBrain metastases are a frequent and severe complication of advanced cancers, particularly non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) and metastatic breast cancer (MBC). They significantly worsen prognosis and quality of life, while remaining difficult to manage due to the blood–brain barrier (BBB), which limits the penetration of conventional chemo
By Ana Espino | Published on October 23, 2025 | 3 min read
Brain metastases are a frequent and severe complication of advanced cancers, particularly non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) and metastatic breast cancer (MBC). They significantly worsen prognosis and quality of life, while remaining difficult to manage due to the blood–brain barrier (BBB), which limits the penetration of conventional chemotherapies into brain tissue.
Current therapeutic options rely primarily on local treatments (surgery, radiotherapy), but these are often exhausted in patients with active or progressive brain disease. Therefore, finding chemotherapeutic agents that can effectively cross the BBB remains a critical — and largely unresolved — challenge.
Brain metastases are a frequent and severe complication of advanced cancers, particularly non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) and metastatic breast cancer (MBC). They significantly worsen prognosis and quality of life, while remaining difficult to manage due to the blood–brain barrier (BBB), which limits the penetration of conventional chemotherapies into brain tissue.
Current therapeutic options rely primarily on local treatments (surgery, radiotherapy), but these are often exhausted in patients with active or progressive brain disease. Therefore, finding chemotherapeutic agents that can effectively cross the BBB remains a critical — and largely unresolved — challenge.
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Scientific reference
Nagpal, S., et al. (2025). Etirinotecan Pegol (NKTR-102) in Patients With Active Brain Metastases From Lung or Breast Cancer. Cancer reports (Hoboken, N.J.), 8(9), e70330
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