Early detection of cancer is important, as it can help with better outcomes and sometimes less extensive treatment. Detecting cancer prior to symptoms could ensure even earlier diagnoses, and a new study finds blood tests may be able find signs of cancer several years before symptoms.

Johns Hopkins recently published the findings of research they did into the effectiveness of multicancer early detection tests, which use plasma samples to search for circulating tumor DNA. The study, which can be read in the journal Cancer Discovery, involved looking at plasma samples from 52 participants in the National Institutes of Health-funded Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities study. Half of them had been diagnosed with cancer within six months of the samples being taken, while the rest were cancer-free and served as controls.

The team found that eight of the cancer patients had a positive multicancer early detection test, and all of them were diagnosed with cancer within four months. Six of the eight had samples from more than three years prior to their diagnoses, and four of them had the same mutations detected by the test at that time. This suggests that circulating tumor DNA may be detectable more than three years before a cancer diagnosis. If so, it could mean much better outcomes for patients.

Dr. Yuxuan Wang, lead author and assistant professor of oncology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, says, “Three years earlier provides time for intervention. The tumors are likely to be much less advanced and more likely to be curable.”

The researchers say, going forward, it would need to be determined how to proceed after a positive test. 

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