British physicians are called a new cancer blood test a “game changer” and “a new era” after a trial turned up dozens of early-stage undiagnosed cancer cases.
The test, which is called Galleri test, looks for multiple and different kinds of cancer DNA within a person’s blood. As a result, they not only have the ability to identify various cases in much earlier cancer stages, but they can even learn where to look for it in the body.
Just recently, the Pathfinder Trial was completed with 6,621 adults over the age of 50 who took the Galleri blood test. From that group, the test came back positive in at least 92 patients, 35 of which already had solid tumors but none of them having any early symptoms.
The tumors, which were discovered in the colon, liver, breast and blood, were mostly too small to be detected normally for the most part, or in the case of the others, not the type of cancer that gets routinely tested, such as ovarian and pancreatic cancers, which normally are diagnosed late and have a high mortality rate.
Director of evidence and implementation at Cancer Research UK, Naer Turabi, explained in an article with The Guardian, “Blood tests for multiple types of cancer used to belong in the realm of science fiction, but now they are an area of cancer research that is showing promise for patients.”
He added, “Research like this is crucial for making progress against late-stage cancers and giving more patients the chance of a good outcome. The Pathfinder trial results give us a better understanding of how frequently cancer is found by this blood test in people who haven’t been previously diagnosed.”
Since the results of the Galleri test were released, NHS England has called it a potential “gamechanger,” and will go on to conduct a major trial that will now involve 165,000 people next year.
Medical experts and doctors hope that this test will help save lives by detecting early cancer stages that can be treated via surgery or early treatment.
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