Commenting on the ganetespib study, Marjorie G. Zauderer, MD, a medical oncologist at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York, said that this first-in-class study suggests efficacy and represents a potential advance in lung cancer treatment. “We haven’t had any advances in a long time. We await the results of the phase III trial,” she said.

Andrew D. Seidman, MD, another medical oncologist from Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, said that heat shock protein 90 inhibitors are also being studied in breast cancer and other cancers. “This approach of harnessing a chaperone protein is applicable to other tumor types,” he stated. ■

Disclosure: Drs. Zauderer and Seidman reported no potential conflicts of interest.