What the New Cancer Diagnosis Tool Can Tell You That Older Methods Cannot

Continuing the list of ambiguous tests for cancer, many people suspected of having cancer are tested for the following:

• Interleukin-6 (IL-6) is a marker of inflammation, and inflammation is a sign of advanced cancer. However, IL-6 levels are also elevated in arthritis, atherosclerosis, burns, infections, and tissue injury.
• Matrix metalloproteinase 2 (MMP2) and matrix metalloproteinase 9 (MMP9) measure enzymes that help break down proteins. Levels of these two enzymes are elevated when cancer has become metastatic, "breaking out" of the tissues that previously confined it. However, these enzymes are also elevated autoimmune disease, cardiovascular disease, and pregnancy.
• Vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) stimulates the growth of new blood vessels. Tumors turning metastatic develop their own blood supply with the help of VEGF. However, VEGF levels are also elevated in diabetic retinopathy, macular degeneration, and rheumatoid arthritis.

There is one more test for cancer that also leads to about as much misunderstanding as accurate diagnosis. The familiar prostate specific antigen (PSA) indicates inflammation of the prostate, but it doesn’t indicate the specific source of the inflammation of the prostate. Sometimes a finger exam is enough to raise PSA levels temporarily. High PSA levels do not necessarily mean men have prostate cancer. Low PSA levels do not necessarily mean they do not.

Every biomarker for cancer generates false positives. They are present when the people being tested don't have cancer. Sometimes these tests generate more than four times as many false positives as true indications of the disease. You don't want to have people living in terror of a disease that will never happen, or to begin treatment of a disease that does not exist, especially when a test can't distinguish between cancer and pregnancy, even in men.

The new test, developed in a lab led by Dr. Hassan Haboubi, doesn't look for indicators with ambiguous interpretations. Instead, it measures a single protein in the blood that determines the "stickiness" of red blood cells in the bloodstream. This protein acts a little like Velcro, by binding proteins to red blood cells so the red blood cells can carry them throughout the body. Without this "Velcro," red blood cells can't deliver the regulators that counteract pre-cancerous changes in cancer throughout the body. 

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Dr. Haboubi and his collaborators identified an antibody that can "stick" to this protein on the surface of red blood cells. When they expose a blood sample to the antigen and the cells come back "naked," then there are good indications that they have the mutation that keeps them from assisting the body in stopping cancer development. Most people who have this mutation, Haboubi says, almost inevitably develop cancer over the next 10 years.

As this article is being written, the test is only available in the United Kingdom and only validated for predicting the future risk of one of the hardest kinds of cancer to treat, esophageal cancer. In the near future, the test will have been validated for many more forms of cancer and made available around the world. This test is a major advancement in the early detection of cancer that can lead to preventive action without needless worry.