Developing a high sensitivity, minimally-invasive screening test for ovarian cancer

This project aims to establish the feasibility of a low-cost, minimally invasive screening test for the early detection and treatment of ovarian cancer.

Research overview

Ovarian cancer has poorest prognosis of all the gynaecological cancers, due to its hidden and not easily detected presentation. No early screening test exists for ovarian cancer.
This project team is finalising an ultra-sensitive, high-throughput test using plasma.

The team proposes to:

  • interrogate an ovarian cancer biobank to develop a rapid ovarian cancer screening test; and
  • undertake a prospective cohort study to determine the sensitivity and specificity of this test.

This project will allow the project team to establish the feasibility of a low-cost, minimally invasive screening test for the early detection and treatment of ovarian cancer.

Why this project is important

Ovarian cancer is one of the deadliest gynaecologic cancers in the world and, globally, 240,000 women are diagnosed with ovarian cancer every year. There are three histological forms of ovarian cancer including epithelial, germ cell and stromal cell. The most common (>90% cases) is the epithelial form. Ovarian cancer is often not detected at early stage of disease progression as the symptoms are generally non-specific and there is an absence of effective early screening methods.

Accordingly, ovarian cancer is usually diagnosed at advanced stages. This is problematic, as ovarian cancer has high metastatic potential from stage II and a high mortality rate. There are approximately 14,000 ovarian cancer deaths annually in the United States. These advanced stages have a survival rate at 5 years of less than 39% of cases for Stage III and less than 17% for Stage IV. Recurrent ovarian cancer is currently incurable and 70% of patients diagnosed with stage III or IV ovarian cancer will have a recurrence within 5 years.

Project researchers

Professor Matt Kemp
Dr Sean Carter

Partners

National University of Singapore
National University Hospital, Singapore
A *Star

Funders

National University Health System, Singapore

Project timeline

Two years. 2024 – 2026

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