New Blood Test Screens for Cancers With 99.4% Accuracy
In
the vast majority of cases, cancer is not the fatal diagnosis it once
was, but the key to recovery is early detection, which is still a
problem for those cancer types that are more difficult to diagnose at
earlier stages. But even here, the world of medicine is constantly
making significant progress, and an excellent example of this is a new
blood test that is capable of detecting over 20 types of cancer,
including the more difficult-to-diagnose varieties like cervical,
pancreatic, colorectal and breast cancer, with a 99.4% accuracy.
What Is This Test?
The
blood test is based on cutting-edge genetic research that attempts to
detect the genetic changes that happen to their DNA when a person is
suffering from cancer. More specifically, the test looks for abnormal
methylation in the DNA, which is a process when the DNA is altered by
compounds known as methyl groups. The presence of these genetic
abnormalities can point to different cancers, which is exactly what this
new blood screening is trying to pinpoint.
The
test was developed by Harvard University scientists at the Dana-Farber
Cancer Institute, and it has recently undergone a series of trials
suggesting the test is effective at diagnosing many different cancers.
Out of the 3,586 blood samples collected from both cancer patients and
healthy controls alike, the test identified cancer patients correctly
with amazing 99.4% precision.
Furthermore, the scientists checked how well the test approximates the origin of the cancer,
and it turns out that the test gets that right as well with 89%
precision. But one of the greatest goals of the study was to show that
the blood test is capable of detecting 14 high-risk cancers that account for 63% of cancer deaths, such as esophagus, breast, lung, gastric, ovary, pancreatic cancer, and others.
These
cancers were detected correctly with 76% accuracy. More specifically,
within this high-risk cancer group, the test accurately detected Stage I
cancer 32% of the time, stage II - 76%, Stage III - 85%, and Stage IV -
93%. This is a great success, as many of these high mortality cancers
are typically found in more advanced and difficult-to-treat stages.
Overall,
this one blood test successfully detected ⅓ of patients with stage one
cancer and ¾ of those suffering from stage two cancer, so it has an
excellent potential of really improving current diagnostic practices and
prevent many deaths. The researchers have recently presented the results of
this trial in September 2019, at the European Society for Medical
Oncology (ESMO) Congress, and hopefully, this revolutionary technique
will soon become a successful diagnostic tool for physicians worldwide.