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Predicting the probability of cancer spread in early-stage bowel cancer patients

Lead researcher: Professor Joanne Edwards

Location: University of Glasgow

Grant award: £18,300

Professor Edwards and her team were looking at the changes cancers go through when they spread to other organs. They compared cancer cells from patients with early-stage disease with those from patients whose bowel cancer has spread.

The challenge

Cancer spread, or metastasis, is the main cause of death from solid cancers including bowel cancer, as once a cancer has spread from its original site to other organs it becomes much more difficult to cure. 

More aggressive treatment, such as stronger chemotherapy or more invasive surgery, may give a better chance of curing a cancer, but will also have a more significant impact on health and wellbeing. Someone who has a lower risk of metastasis may prefer milder treatment, but without being able to accurately predict a person’s risk it’s hard to help patients make informed decisions about this. 

Finding a way to predict which patients are at higher risk of metastasis would help with making the best treatment decisions for each patient. 

The science behind the project

Cancer cells undergoing metastasis show certain physical changes to help them spread. Professor Edwards and her team looked at markers of these changes in bowel cancer samples, from patients with early stage disease and patients with metastasis.  

They were investigating if even at the early stages of bowel cancer there are changes in these markers, and if there’s any pattern between this and the clinical outcomes of the patients who gave the samples. 

Four circles in a line containing images of magnified sections of human bowel tissue. Each circle shows the tissue after being fluorescently stained to show different proteins of interest. The first circle is has yellow cells with a deep purple background and is a combined image of the following three. The second has teal cells with a blue background. The third has bright pink cells with a purple background. The final circle has pale yellow cells with a deep purple background. The image has a black background.

Results

This study found three key markers which can predict bowel cancer patients’ likelihood of survival and recurrence, depending on which markers are high or low. Patients with the “worst” levels had a 94% recurrence rate of their bowel cancer. 

What difference will this project make?

This combination of markers could be used to identify which bowel cancer patients have a higher risk of their disease spreading. 

Developing a clinical tool which can predict a patient's likelihood of their cancer recurring will support both patients and their clinicians when making decisions about the best therapy options, such balancing side effects with treating the cancer, or how often to have check-ups. 

The study was done on the sort of tissue samples that are taken in biopsies or surgery, so adding this extra test probably wouldn’t require anything else from patients. 

 

Professor Joanne Edwards (left) and two scientists (centre and right) from her group standing and smiling in a lab

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