Lung cancer is the second most common form of cancer, and by far the most common cancer death among both men and women1. Symptoms often appear late, at an advanced, non-curable stage.
Most of the existing pharmaceuticals target late stage (III and IV) lung cancer patients. However, these treatments only have effect in about 30% of cases.
Moreover, the current standard method for detection of lung cancer and screening of risk groups in the USA – LDCT (Low Dose CT Scanning) – has a low specificity. Data from the National Lung Screening Trial (NLST) in the USA showed that 96.4% of positive LDCT’s are benign findings (false positives)2. LDCT also delivers a potentially harmful dose of radiation.
Early detection of lung cancer saves lives – this was demonstrated in the NLS Trial2, where annual screening with LDCT resulted in a 20% improvement in lung cancer mortality. However, because the number of false positive results when using LDCT is so high, a test for the early detection of lung cancer that can better differentiate between false and true positives is needed. Improved screening of high risk groups before imaging could also greatly increase survival rates.
In addition, patient monitoring using a more reliable and accurate test could help clinicians better select appropriate treatment, by assisting in the early differentiation of responders to treatment and non-responders.
A collaborative, retrospective study, performed together with a major pharma company, showed that an IMMray™ blood-based biomarker signature is able to differentiate healthy controls from non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) samples with a 95 % accuracy (press release August 9, 2018). NSCLC is by far (80%) the most common type of lung cancer, accounting for nearly 14% of all new cancers.
The retrospective study that was performed to assess the technical performance of the IMMray™ platform in lung cancer, included 100 serum samples: 50 NSCLC and 50 controls.
Having previously also demonstrated high (98%) accuracy in the detection of pancreatic cancer, we believe IMMray™ has the potential to become a standard common platform for cancer diagnosis based on blood samples, including the screening and diagnosis of lung cancer.
