Imagine having a disease but not knowing about it until it’s too late to do anything.
That’s often the case with some types of head and neck cancer, especially the ones caused by HPV (a common virus). When these cancers come back, it can make life difficult.
Talking, swallowing, and even breathing can become challenging tasks.
Right now, the only way doctors can tell if this type of cancer is coming back is by waiting for these symptoms to show up or by doing a blood test that might not catch it early enough. But researchers are working to change that.
A Better Way to Monitor
Researchers at the University of Michigan Health Rogel Cancer Center have been looking into better ways to find out if this cancer is making a comeback.
In two studies, they tried to figure out who is most at risk for the cancer to return and how to keep an eye out for it.
To do this, they looked at medical records for 450 patients with head and neck cancer. Some had cancer linked to HPV, and others didn’t.
They found that people with HPV-linked cancer usually faced a return of the disease much later than those who didn’t have the HPV link.
This is useful because it helps doctors decide how often they need to check on each patient. Also, they found that this type of cancer, when it comes back, is more likely to spread to the lungs.
With these insights, doctors hope to set up a better “watch system” by combining regular blood tests and body scans to catch the cancer before it becomes untreatable.
Right now, these findings are like a roadmap, giving doctors ideas on what to look for in future studies.
A Blood Test Like No Other
So, how can we detect cancer recurrence much earlier? The answer might be in a new type of blood test. Your blood has tiny pieces of DNA that cancer cells leave behind.
Currently used blood tests are not that great at picking up these tiny pieces, but the Michigan team has come up with a better test.
This new test can pick up even the smallest amount of cancer-linked DNA in your blood.
The researchers made it more effective by looking for nine different kinds of DNA pieces that are linked to HPV at the same time. This makes the test more sensitive, meaning it can catch cancer much earlier than before.
What’s Next?
These developments are like the first pieces of a puzzle that might someday give doctors the ability to catch cancer early enough to actually stop it.
Right now, doctors can only respond to symptoms after they show up. This new research aims to allow them to act much sooner, possibly even before symptoms start.
By catching the disease early, there’s a chance to not only improve the quality of life for the patient but also make the disease treatable when it would otherwise be incurable.
Researchers are still working on this, but it’s a hopeful first step.
The researchers at the University of Michigan are excited about the potential of their work.
They believe that by working together, they can create even more tools to help people with cancer live better, longer lives. And that’s good news for everyone.
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The research findings can be found in Cancer and Oral Oncology.
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