The promise of liquid biopsies in prostate cancer: a potential point-of-care modality for precision oncology.

Introduction: Blood-based liquid biopsies represent a transformative, minimally-invasive, and patient-friendly approach. Tumor-derived components in the bloodstream, are at the forefront of active research for diagnosis and prediction of prognosis. Early cancer detection and real-time monitoring of treatment effectiveness are the most relevant from the perspective of both the clinicians and the patients. A demand for noninvasive markers is ably powered by sustained advancements in high-throughput technologies such as Next Generation Sequencing and mass spectrometry, paired with artificial intelligence and machine learning, which are requisites in expanding the power of liquid biopsies through multi-analyte tests.

Areas covered: In this review, we present the current developments in the domain of liquid biopsy for prostate cancer with specific examples of relevant blood-based biomarkers, FDA-approved tests, advanced methodologies that dominated the expansion of this field, and also discuss common challenges in incorporating these tests in routine clinical practice. Nonetheless, as validation data progressively accumulates, liquid biopsies could change our approach and overall experience with diagnosis, dynamic customized treatments, and overall prognosis in prostate cancer patients.

Expert opinion: Through interdisciplinary collaborations, blood-based diagnostic markers will emerge as accurate surrogates for routine screening, treatment response prediction/evaluation, and prognosis prediction in prostate cancer patients in the future.