7 hours Ago By Michael Irving
Scientists at Oregon Health and Science University (OHSU) have developed a new blood test for pancreatic cancer, one of the most deadly forms of the disease. Tests showed up to 85% accuracy in detection, even in early stages. Pancreatic cancer doesn’t have many obvious symptoms in its early stages, so it’s rarely diagnosed until it has spread to other organs.
As such, it has an alarmingly low . Finding new ways to diagnose the disease earlier is crucial. Now, researchers at OHSU have developed a blood test that can identify early-stage pancreatic cancer with high sensitivity and specificity.
Elevated blood levels of certain proteins, called proteases, are a biomarker of pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC), so the team developed a nanosensor assay they call PAC-MANN that will fluoresce in response to these proteins. In tests on samples taken from 350 patients, PAC-MANN was able to identify 73% of PDAC cases across all stages. It was also able to rule out 98% of patients without cancer, and could distinguish 100% of patients with a different form of pancreatic disease that wasn’t cancerous.
In follow-up tests, PAC-MANN was paired with a test for the current best clinical biomarker, CA 19-9. It was found to be 85% sensitive for stage 1 PDAC, and 96% accuracy for ruling out healthy controls. This sensitivity, as well as the ease of use, makes it a good candidate for early screening.
“Our test could be used for people at high risk of pancreatic cancer, which is not targeted by current tests,” said Jose Montoya Mira, lead author of the study. “It allows for a more robust and less invasive screening, unlike an endoscopic ultrasound and other liquid biopsy tests that require large volumes of blood, thus allowing our test to be performed more frequently for earlier detection.” Other emerging options for diagnosing pancreatic cancer earlier include spotting and even analyzing the bacterial .
This promising new blood test could provide another option of detecting pancreatic cancer earlier, hopefully giving patients better odds for survival. “The big difference with this test is the cost: It takes only 8 microliters of blood and 45 minutes to run the test at a cost of less than a penny per sample,” said Montoya. “This could easily be used in rural and underserved settings, where traditional tests are not or cannot be used.
” The research was published in the journal . Source:.
