‘Brillo pad’ cancer test
Sponge on a string detects signs of deadly gullet disease
THE diagnosis of one of Britain’s most deadly cancers could be revolutionised by a tiny ‘Brillo pad’ on a string.
The brainchild of Cambridge University doctors, it takes just five minutes to gather as many as half a million cells from the gullet. These can then be analysed for the telltale signs of oesophageal cancer.
It is hoped the £25 test kit will detect dangerous changes ten to 15 years earlier than at present, making it a lifesaver. If it fulfils its early promise, it could even be used to screen everyone aged 50 and over.
Difficulties in diagnosing the disease mean it is often recognised too late. As a result, oesophageal cancer is UK’s sixth biggest cancer killer, with 7,700 deaths a year.
Just 13 per cent of the 8,300 Britons diagnosed each year are alive f i ve years l ater –a statistic described as ‘ abysmally awful’ by the gadget’s inventor, Professor Rebecca Fitzgerald.
The Cytosponge, as it is called, consists of a small, wiry sponge packed inside a capsule the size of a multi-vitamin pill and attached to a string. Swallowed by the patient, the capsule dissolves in the stomach after a few minutes and the sponge unfurls. A nurse then simply uses the string to pull it back up the oesophagus, the food pipe between the throat and the stomach.Up to half a million cells stick to the sponge, the journal Nature Genetics reports.
The procedure is simple enough to be done in a GP’s surgery and most patients reported no great discomfort. By contrast, current techniques involve a more invasive endoscopic biopsy at hospital under local anaesthetic, which is also expensive. Plus, the biopsy generally only removes cells from a small section of the oesophagus – unlike the Cytosponge, which travels its whole length.
Professor Fitzgerald said: ‘If you are taking a biopsy, it relies on you hitting the right spot. Using the Cytosponge appears to remove some of this game of chance.’
Analysis of cells trapped on the sponge can reveal Barrett’s oesophagus, a condition which can be a marker for oesophageal cancer. This develops up to 15 years before but often goes unnoticed. Heartburn is the main symptom of oesophageal cancer but this is often dismissed by the GP or the patient.
Dr Richard Davies, a Cambridge GP, said the device could be a ‘game-changer’. He said: ‘The Cytosponge could make a huge difference in terms of investigating patients with potential malignant or pre-malignant conditions.’
Professor Chris Hawkey, president of gut disease charity Core, said: ‘This is an important development. Cancer of the oesophagus is getting more common in part because of obesity. Once symptoms develop it is usually too late to cure, so simple methods of mass screening are the main hope for the future.’