A new study has found that detecting tiny pieces of DNA shed from colon cancer with the help of a blood test can help predict the risk of relapse in the future. The technique being referred by the researchers is called liquid biopsy.
According to the researchers, liquid biopsy help predicts the return of the colon cancer in patients with imperfect accuracy. The technique can be used in patients who are at an early stage of developing the disease.
The researchers say that even though liquid biopsy and other forms of diagnostic tests are not entirely perfect, they can still be used to identify the circulating pieces of colon cancer DNA in the blood. In case the circulating DNA is present in the blood, there are high chances that colon cancer relapse would take place in the patient.
The researchers further explained that Stage 2 colon tumors generally do not spread to other parts of the body. This makes it difficult to assess whether chemotherapy is helping the patient after surgery or not.
Some of these cancer cases are recuring in patients and this further strengthens the need to have proper diagnostic tools that let doctors identify recurrence earlier than the current, conventional methods used to make a diagnosis. The researchers further said that identifying patients at a greater risk of cancer recurrence can help with the future decisions regarding the patient.
During the study, a team of researchers from Johns Hopkins and the University of Melbourne followed more than 200 patients with Stage 2 colon cancer, who were treated at 13 different hospitals in Australia for a period of four years. The team collected more than 1,000 blood samples from the patients before and after they underwent the surgery.
The team also conducted a genetic analysis of the tissue samples derived from the tumor of the patients. Cancer-related mutations were also monitored with the help of DNA tests and patients were required to undergo a CT scan for detection of colon cancer recurrence.
