Related media – Linked media
The biggest problem with blood tests is that, unlike colonoscopies, they don’t detect most precancerous growths on the colon that, if detected and removed, would prevent a person from developing cancer. This, said Dr. Stephen M. Hewitt, a member of the National Cancer Institute board, “really undermines the concept of cancer prevention.”
The test, said Charity J. Morgan, a committee member and professor of biostatistics at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, “is better than nothing for patients who get nothing, but it’s no better than a colonoscopy.”
And there are many people who get nothing.
The FDA noted that one-third of people who should be screened for colorectal cancer are not being screened, and more than 75 percent of those who died were not up-to-date with screening.
If the agency approves the Guardant Health test, the hope is that it could dramatically change the discouraging colon cancer statistics by offering average-risk patients who refuse colonoscopy a convenient option to get screened.
Colon cancer is one of the few cancers that can actually be prevented with screening. This is because the disease begins slowly as a polyp, a small, harmless growth on the wall of the colon. Most polyps never cause any problems, but some eventually turn into cancer. If they are detected and eliminated, cancer is avoided.
Linked media – Connected media
