In Reply In our recently published study,¹ we have shown an association of detection of circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) in follow-up after treatment of breast cancer with a high risk of relapse. The results showed a substantial lead time over clinical relapse of 10.7 months overall and extending to 13.3 months in estrogen receptor–positive, ERBB2-negative breast cancer. This provides evidence for clinical validity of ctDNA molecular relapse assessment. However, our study does not provide evidence of clinical utility, which could only be generated from randomized clinical trials that assess whether treating patients on the basis of ctDNA assessment can improve outcome.

在我们最近发表的研究中，[ ^1]我们显示在乳腺癌复发率高的随访中，检测循环肿瘤DNA（ctDNA）的相关性。结果显示，在整个临床复发中，可预见的交货时间为10.7个月，而雌激素受体阳性，ERBB2阴性的乳腺癌患者可延长至13.3个月。这为ctDNA分子复发评估的临床有效性提供了证据。但是，我们的研究没有提供临床实用性的证据，只能从根据ctDNA评估评估治疗患者是否可以改善预后的随机临床试验中得出。