On Healthy Living

Hate the idea of getting a colonoscopy?  In a few years you may not have to endure one.  A simple blood test may eventually replace this dreaded test.

Researchers have found that the blood proteins colon-cancer-specific antigen-3 (CCSA-3) and CCSA-4 were in every patient with colon cancer and even in most with patients with polyps that are on their way to becoming colon cancers.

Somehow these proteins, which appear to be cast off from cancer cells, find their way into the bloodstream where they can easily be detected and measured.  These proteins do not appear to be in the blood of healthy subjects.

Durado Brooks, MD, MPH, director of prostate and colorectal cancers for the American Cancer Society, notes that everyone who tests positive on the blood test would then need a colonoscopy and calls the new findings “very encouraging, but very early.”

Angie Hurst wrote this on March 29th, 2008 and filed it under Healthy Living |