Detection of cancers three years prior to diagnosis using plasma cell-free DNA
Menée à partir d'échantillons plasmatiques prélevés sur 26 patients atteints d'un cancer et 26 témoins, cette étude met en évidence la possibilité de détecter l'ADN tumoral circulant au moins 3 ans avant le diagnostic de la maladie
To explore how early can cancers be detected prior to clinical signs or symptoms, we assessed prospectively collected serial plasma samples from the Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities (ARIC) study, including 26 participants diagnosed with cancer and 26 matched controls. At the index time point, eight of these 52 participants scored positively with a multicancer early detection (MCED) test. All eight participants were diagnosed with cancer within 4 months after blood collection. In six of these 8 participants, we were able to assess an earlier plasma sample collected 3.1 to 3.5 years prior to clinical diagnosis. In four of these six participants, the same mutations detected by the MCED test could be identified, but at 8.6 to 79-fold lower mutant allele fractions. These results demonstrate that it is possible to detect circulating tumor DNA more than three years prior to clinical diagnosis, and provide benchmark sensitivities required for this purpose.
Cancer Discovery , article en libre accès, 2025