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AACR 2007: Epigenomics Improving Colorectal Cancer Detection Success Rate
By Trevor | April 18, 2007
Berlin- and Seattle-based Epigenomics AG has announced at the Annual Meeting 2007 of the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) that it has significantly improved its success rate at detecting colorectal cancer by analyzing DNA methylation in blood serum. The increased success of detection was mediated by altering the assay procedure and rules for test result interpretation.
The poster presentation by Cathy Lofton-Day, Ph. D., Vice President Molecular Biology of Epigenomics, focused on the benefits of modifications of the assay procedure and rules for test result interpretation on the performance of Septin 9 for the early detection of colorectal cancer in blood plasma. Using these modifications Septin 9 detected 70% (91 out of 130) of the colorectal cancers in the study and was falsely positive in only 10% (19 out of 183) of the cancer-free controls. When specificity was set at 97% (3% false positive rate in the non-cancerous controls) 63% of cancers were reliably detected. More importantly, the 70% cancer detection rate was also achieved in individuals found to have earlier stage disease (stage I-III, 75 out of 107).
Epigenomics is now focusing on further streamlining and simplification of the assay procedure to decrease test costs, improve ease-of-use and thus facilitate transfer into clinical routine use.
The PDF of the poster presented by Dr. Lofton-Day is available at the Epigenomics web site.
In July 2006 Epigenomics announced that it had improved its colorectal cancer detection rate by using a Septin9 methylation assay in conjunction with a previously unidentified marker, ALX4. This new data seems to suggest that Epigenomics is now trying to improve detection through analysis of Septin9 alone, possibly to streamline the development of the assay for clinical use. Link
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Topics: cancer |
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