Advancing Treatment Strategies and Real-World Perspectives for mCRC and GI Neuroendocrine Neoplasms; With Rocío García-Carbonero, MD, PhD

Welcome to OncLive On Air®! I’m your host today, Jax DiEugenio.

In today’s episode, we spoke with Rocío García-Carbonero, MD, PhD, about treatment trends in colorectal cancer (CRC) and other gastrointestinal (GI) malignancies, spotlighting key takeaways from the 2025 ESMO GI Cancers Congress. Dr García-Carbonero is a medical oncologist and head of the Medical Oncology Department at Hospital Universitario 12 de Octubre in Madrid, Spain.

In our conversation, Dr García-Carbonero discussed a subgroup analysis from the phase 3 FRESCO-2 trial (NCT04322539), which evaluated fruquintinib (Fruzaqla) in previously treated metastatic CRC (mCRC). She reviewed efficacy outcomes by metastatic site, including liver-only, lung-only, bone, and peritoneal disease. Fruquintinib demonstrated improvements in overall survival and progression-free survival across all subgroups, underscoring its feasibility in later-line settings for patients with mCRC. She also addressed prognostic differences between metastatic sites, noting that all patient groups derived benefit from treatment. Dr García-Carbonero also shared findings from PROMETCO, the first international, prospective, real-world study in mCRC, which is examining real-world outcomes for this patient population.

Additionally, at the meeting Dr García-Carbonero participated in a multidisciplinary, case-based session focused on GI and neuroendocrine neoplasms. She outlined the clinical distinctions between well-differentiated neuroendocrine tumors and poorly differentiated neuroendocrine carcinomas (NECs), using a case of poorly differentiated NEC of the colon to illustrate diagnostic and therapeutic considerations. She cautioned against the use of somatostatin receptor PET imaging in poorly differentiated disease and underscored the importance of molecular profiling, noting that over 20% of patients may harbor actionable alterations or markers, such as BRAF mutations, microsatellite instability, or RAS mutations.

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