Building on Molecular and Clinical Progress
June 17-18, 2002
The first SOTS meeting on adult sarcomas produced several key recommendations for further research in pathology, molecular pathogenesis and classification, targeted therapeutics development, epidemiology, prognostic assessment, imaging, and clinical management. Discussion points included consideration of prospective molecular pathways and targets for therapeutic intervention, important issues that require study in the local management and control of soft tissue sarcomas, key research questions related to retroperitoneal sarcomas, and central research and clinical issues in sarcoma biology/pathology, surgery and radiation therapy. Recurrent themes were the need for enhanced bioinformatics, addressing the critical shortage of an appropriate tissue resource to better define the biologic and molecular characteristics of these tumors, and the importance of applying lessons learned from the GIST/imatinib experience to guide the continued development of targeted systemic therapeutics in sarcomas as well as other solid tumors. Overarching recommendations included the need for more interdisciplinary collaboration and infrastructure development for concerted molecular studies.