Highly Accurate Blood Test Detects Pancreatic Cancer Early in At-Risk Patients

By LabMedica International staff writers
Posted on 05 Aug 2024

Image: The simple blood-based test can detect proteins and antibodies that indicate a high-risk individual has developed pancreatic cancer (Photo courtesy of Immunovia)

Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC), the most prevalent type of pancreatic cancer, is highly lethal but can potentially be cured with surgery and modern treatments. There is a pressing need for a simple, quick, and accessible blood test to diagnose pancreatic cancer early in at-risk individuals. Now, a new pancreatic cancer detection test offers significantly improved accuracy, fulfilling this need and potentially boosting survival rates for these patients.

Immunovia AB (Lund, Sweden) has reported enhanced outcomes for its next-generation test aimed at detecting early-stage PDAC in high-risk individuals. In April 2024, the company shared positive outcomes from the preliminary model-development study of its innovative pancreatic cancer detection test. This study incorporated 624 patient samples collected from 13 distinct clinical sites, including 129 samples from patients diagnosed with stage 1 or 2 PDAC and 495 control samples, primarily from individuals at elevated risk for hereditary and/or familial pancreatic cancer. The control group also included individuals with pancreatic cysts, diabetics, and healthy subjects.

The test's performance was refined through the inclusion of additional samples, which provided more comprehensive and specific clinical data, and the application of advanced statistical modeling techniques. These improvements have significantly increased the test's accuracy, boosting the sensitivity of this next-generation test to 85% and its specificity to 98% for detecting stage 1 and 2 PDAC. A sensitivity rate of 85% indicates that the test can identify pancreatic cancer in about six out of every seven people with early-stage disease. A specificity rate of 98% means that only about one in every 50 people tested who do not have pancreatic cancer would receive a false positive result.

"We have now completed research and development efforts for our next-generation test and are thrilled with the accuracy of the test," said Jeff Borcherding, CEO of Immunovia. "This is a critical milestone for the company. Our next-generation test shows tremendous promise for improving pancreatic cancer surveillance with a highly accurate, convenient and affordable test. We are very optimistic about the clinical impact of the test when we launch in the U.S. in 2025."

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