Overview of targeted therapies in Oncology

BACKGROUND: Recent scientific advances have provided a map of the human genome along with a better understanding of the processes that transform healthy cells into diseased cells. This has led to the emergence of a new class of drugs called targeted therapies. OBJECTIVE: To describe the classifications and basic pharmacology of targeted therapies. METHODS: A literature search was performed for peer reviewed journal articles using Medline (1996-2007), Embase (1996-2007) and Google. The search was performed using keywords such as angiogenesis inhibitors, cancer vaccines, gene therapy, monoclonal antibodies, small molecules, proteasome inhibitors, targeted therapy and tyrosine kinase inhibitors. CONCLUSIONS: A review of the basic pharmacology is described in this article, including the following major categories of targeted therapies: * Small molecule drugs * Monoclonal antibodies * Apoptosis-inducing drugs * Angiogenesis Inhibitors * Cancer vaccines * Gene therapy.