Rueters Health Article

[mitzu]

WASHINGTON (Reuters) Jul 17 - A blood test that looks for patterns of antibody responses to tumors may provide a way to detect lung cancer long before an X-ray or CT scan could, U.S. researchers reported on Friday.

The test correctly predicted non-small-cell lung cancer in blood samples taken from patients years before they were actually diagnosed with lung cancer, the researchers reported.

If the test's reliability can be confirmed, it might become the first new blood screen for any cancer since the PSA test. The test is licensed to Rockville, Maryland-based 20/20 GeneSystems Inc.

"These data suggest antibody profiling could be a powerful tool for early detection when incorporated into a comprehensive screening strategy," Li Zhong and colleagues at the University of Kentucky write in their report, published in the Journal of Thoracic Oncology.

When they the researchers evaluated the test in people who were being treated for lung cancer, it correctly identified 90 percent of cases, and with very few false positives in samples taken from people who did not have lung cancer.

The researchers tested blood samples taken from some of the lung cancer patients years before they were diagnosed. The test found cancer in four out of seven samples taken a year before diagnoses, and in all 18 samples taken two, three and four years earlier.

"Based on doubling times, a lung cancer can be present three to five years before reaching the conventional size limits of radiographic detection," Zhong's team points out.