New Tests detect ovarian cancer earlier

New Tests detect ovarian cancer earlier
- A British study published on Wednesday says,Doctors screening women for ovarian cancer were able to pick up the disease about two years earlier than normal.

Scientists have long searched for a way to identify Ovarian Cancer which kills about 100 000 women worldwide every year. 90% of women can survive if detected early.

However, most women are currently only diagnosed with the disease after it has spread, when there is only a maximum 30% chance of survival.

In the British study, doctors enrolled approximately 200 000 post-menopausal women aged 50 to 74 across the United Kingdom from 2001 to 2005. About 100 000 of those women received no screening tests.

The remaining half were split into two groups. Roughly 50 000 were screened with a blood test. If the blood test results suggested an abnormality, they then had an ultrasound. The rest of the women, nearly 50 000, received an ultrasound only.

In the women who had a blood test first, researchers found 38 who had cancer. In those who only had an ultrasound, there were 32 cancer cases. Using the blood test method, ovarian cancer was picked up 89% of the time. With the ultrasound, the rate was about 75%.

In these preliminary results, doctors found nearly half of the cancers detected were at an early stage. Normally, doctors would only catch about 15% of early ovarian cancer patients.

The study was published online on Wednesday in the medical journal, Lancet Oncology.