The fight against cancer obviously involves research into therapies. But improving the detection of the disease is also essential. The sooner a patient’s cancer is diagnosed, the faster it can be treated. Figures show that, detected at an early stage, the chances of an average 5-year survival are 91%. At a late stage, the percentage drops to 26%.
Detection research had so far been carried out on people already diagnosed as having cancer. But a study started in Taizhou, China, in 2007 already. And on a very large scale. It consisted of collecting blood plasma samples from 123,115 healthy people for long-term storage. By following all these volunteers over the years, we were then able to catalog these samples according to whether the patient subsequently developed cancer or not. And tests were carried out to find out if it was possible in patients with the disease to detect it in their old blood samples. The answer is yes, as a team of Chinese and American researchers have just written in “Nature”.
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Called PanSeer, their blood screening test was able to detect several types of cancer for up to four years before the usual detection methods, and with great efficiency. The five types of cancer detected were those of the stomach, esophagus, colorectal, lung and liver. The researchers point out, and this is important, that this test does not predict future cancer in a completely healthy person. He is able to spot cancerous growths, already existing in people whose symptoms are not yet seen with other screening methods. And saving up to four years in finding cancer would save lives.
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