RE: The Galleri Test Adopted by NHS13 Sep 2021 11:53
A potentially life-saving blood test that can detect more than 50 types of cancer will be offered to NHS patients from today, as part of the world’s largest trial.
Patients in Cumbria, Greater Manchester, the North East, West Midlands, East Midlands, East of England, Cheshire, Merseyside, Kent, Medway and southeast London, will receive letters inviting them to take part in the trial.
If results of the trial are deemed successful, the blood test will be offered to millions more patients as from 2024.
Previous research published in June analysed how the test worked in 2,823 cancer patients, and 1,254 otherwise healthy individuals. It identified cancer in 51.5 percent of cases across all stages of the disease, with a mere false positive rate of 0.5 percent.
Around 55 percent of blood cancers were detected, and the tissue where the cancer was located was identified in 88.7 percent of cases. The test was able to generate positive test results 65.5 percent of tumours are not screened for, which is twice as many tumours which are screened for, such as prostate, bowel, breast and cervical cancer.