Blood test for prostate cancer detection

It was reported recently by researchers that a test that can detect ovarian cancer can also be used to detect prostate cancer, which can potentially save many men the embarrassment and discomfort of a biopsy. Prostate cancer is the second-biggest cancer killer in men. The incidence of prostate cancer increases with advancing age to the extent that if one were to live long enough without any other disease, one would eventually die of this disease. American Cancer Society predicts that 189,000 men will be diagnosed with prostate cancer this year and 30,000 will die of it. It is often found using a PSA test, which checks for levels of a protein called prostate specific antigen that is over-produced by cancerous prostate cells. Men with intermediate scores of between 4 and 10 on the PSA test are usually advised to get a biopsy - which means having a piece of tissue taken out of this delicate area for testing. Up to 80 percent of men who undergo such a biopsy do not turn out to have prostate cancer. This study was conducted by Food and Drug Administration (FDA) - NCI (National Cancer Institute) Clinical Proteomics Programme, USA. They compared blood samples from 31 men known to have prostate cancer with those of 25 cancer-free men. They marked out a baseline serum proteomic pattern found only in the blood of men with cancer. The current test correctly predicted 36 (95%) of 38 patients with prostate cancer, while 177 (78%) of 288 patients were correctly classified as having benign conditions. This new technology has the potential to revolutionize how men are diagnosed with prostate cancer. It is likely that it will be possible to use a simple blood test with a bioinformatics tool to accurately identify men who are affected with a harmful prostate cancer, which avoids healthy men from undergoing unnecessary biopsies.