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Impact of Tumor Heterogeneity on Testing Reliability
Although ovarian cancer shows relatively limited spatial and temporal heterogeneity compared to other cancers, considerations include the following:
- More recent biopsies are preferred for testing when available.
- Blood-based testing (liquid biopsies) can provide genomic information by sampling circulating tumor DNA from the entire tumor burden.
- Cell-free DNA testing is increasingly useful but cannot yet replace tissue-based testing for protein expression markers like HER2 and folate receptor alpha.
Research continues to develop more comprehensive testing through liquid biopsy approaches.