The blood test that can spot 70% of cancer cases early

SCIENTISTS yesterday unveiled a blood test that could change the way doctors screen for cancer.

It can spot eight common forms of the disease and helps identify which part of the body is under attack. Called CancerSEEK, the test looks for mutations in 16 genes and evaluates the levels of eight proteins usually released by sufferers.

The researchers at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore said the overall detection rate was 70 per cent.

The test scored highest in picking up ovarian cancer – with a 98 per cent success rate. It was weakest with breast cancer, spotting only 33 per cent of cases.

Professor Nickolas Papadopoulos, senior author of the US study, published in the journal Science, said: ‘The use of a combination of selected biomarkers for early detection has the potential to change the way we screen for cancer’

The test was evaluated on 1,005 patients with cancers of the ovary, liver, stomach, pancreas, oesophagus, colorectum, lung or breast. Bert Vogelstein, an oncology professor at Johns Hopkins, said that although the test did not spot every cancer, it identified many that would probably otherwise go undetected.

‘Many of the most promising cancer treatments we have today only benefit a small minority of cancer patients, and we consider them major breakthroughs,’ he added. ‘If we are going to make progress in early cancer detection, we have to begin looking at it in a more realistic way, recognising that no test will detect all cancers.

‘This test represents the next step in changing the focus of cancer research from late-stage disease to early disease, which I believe will be critical to reducing cancer deaths in the long term.’