Brain metastasis is emerging as a unique entity in oncology based on its particular biology and, consequently, the pharmacological approaches that should be considered. We discuss the current state of modelling this specific progression of cancer and how these experimental models have been used to test multiple pharmacologic strategies over the years. In spite of pre-clinical evidences demonstrating brain metastasis vulnerabilities, many clinical trials have excluded patients with brain metastasis. Fortunately, this trend is getting to an end given the increasing importance of secondary brain tumors in the clinic and a better knowledge of the underlying biology. We discuss emerging trends and unsolved issues that will shape how we will study experimental brain metastasis in the years to come.

基于其特定的生物学特性，脑转移正在成为肿瘤学中的一个独特实体，因此，应该考虑的药理学方法。我们讨论了建模这种特定癌症进展的当前状态，以及这些实验模型多年来如何用于测试多种药理学策略。尽管有临床前证据表明脑转移的脆弱性，但许多临床试验都排除了脑转移患者。幸运的是，鉴于继发性脑肿瘤在临床中的重要性日益增加以及对潜在生物学的更好了解，这种趋势即将结束。我们讨论了新兴趋势和未解决的问题，这些问题将影响我们在未来几年研究实验性脑转移的方式。