companion diagnostics
Definition
Companion diagnostics are medical devices or tests that provide essential information for the safe and effective use of a corresponding therapeutic product. These diagnostics identify patients most likely to benefit from a particular treatment or those at increased risk for serious adverse reactions. Companion diagnostics typically detect specific biomarkers—such as genetic mutations, protein expression levels, or chromosomal alterations—that predict therapeutic response. They are co-developed with targeted therapies and require FDA approval as part of the drug's regulatory pathway. Examples include HER2 testing for trastuzumab in breast cancer and EGFR mutation testing for erlotinib in non-small cell lung cancer. This precision medicine approach optimizes treatment selection, improves patient outcomes, and reduces healthcare costs by avoiding ineffective therapies.
Visualize companion diagnostics in Nodes Bio
Researchers can use Nodes Bio to map relationships between biomarkers, drug targets, and patient response pathways. Network visualization reveals how diagnostic markers connect to therapeutic mechanisms, downstream signaling cascades, and resistance pathways. Users can explore multi-omics data to identify novel biomarker candidates and visualize the molecular networks that distinguish responders from non-responders, accelerating companion diagnostic development.
Visualization Ideas:
- Biomarker-drug-disease triangle networks showing companion diagnostic relationships
- Signaling pathway networks linking diagnostic markers to therapeutic targets and resistance mechanisms
- Patient stratification networks connecting genomic profiles to treatment response outcomes
Example Use Case
A pharmaceutical company developing a BRAF inhibitor for melanoma needs to identify predictive biomarkers for patient stratification. Researchers integrate genomic data from clinical trials with protein interaction networks and signaling pathway databases. By visualizing the network connections between BRAF mutations, downstream MEK/ERK signaling, and treatment response data, they discover that patients with concurrent mutations in specific pathway regulators show differential responses. This network analysis guides development of a multi-gene companion diagnostic panel that improves patient selection accuracy.