Cancer test breakthrough

Press, 3 August 1985, Page 10

Cancer test breakthrough

NZPA staff correspondent Sydney

Researchers at Melbourne’s Monash University have developed what they believe is the first reliable test for detecting the early stages of cancers of the stomach and digestive tracts.

According to a report yesterday, the test — although not a cure for this serious cancer — is a substantial breakthrough.

It means such cancers can now be tackled before they have the chance to spread, giving a dramatic boost to survival rates. The Australian “Financial Review” says that the blood test has been patented and is in the process of meeting strict Japanese regulations which are one of the last barriers to a possible ?AustBo million world market.

If tumours in the colon or rectum are discovered before they have spread out of that part of the intestine —

previously a big problem because there are few symptoms until the cancer is widespread — they are much easier to cure by surgery. According to the report, the incidence of colorectal cancer is second only to that of lung cancer in men and in women third to breast and cervical cancers. Although there has been intensive study the death rate for colorectal cancer has not dropped significantly in the last 30 years. Only 30 per cent of patients with such extensive cancer will survive five years after surgery, but if the cancer has not spread outside the intestine, the figure jumps to 90 per cent.

Professor Anthony Linnane, the director of the Monash centre for molecular biology and medicine, told the “Financial Review” that it was possible that the blood test would become a standard screening proce-

dure for any patient over a certain age. The test is now effectively owned by a group of Melbourne businessmen who put up ?Aust2 million for the research, but also have a profit sharing agreement with the university. The new test, which took about five years to develop, looks for a particular substance which is generated by the tumours on the walls of the colon, rectum, small intestine and stomach, and finds its way into the blood.

The Monash researchers managed to identify the substance which is the warning signal for the cancer, and developed the diagnostic procedure. One test which already exists for the cancer is only useful for detecting colorectal tumors rather than the whole digestive tract, and is also regarded as not as reliable as the Monash test.

A full patent, which will reveal more details of the test, will be taken out in six months.