Tumor DNA levels may provide clues to patients’ response to treatment
To determine how well tumors responded to cancer treatment, researchers ascertained breast tumor DNA levels circulating in the bloodstream, in a recent study.
Researchers measured 3 biomarkers: circulating tumor DNA, Cancer Antigen 15-3 (CA 15-3) and free-floating tumor cells, in regular blood samples from 30 women with advanced breast cancer that had metastasized.
CT scan results were compared with the blood tests to determine if biomarker changes coincided with changes in the cancer.
Upon examination, researchers established that of the 3 biomarkers, tumor DNA in the women’s blood most accurately showed the changes occurring in the body.
Professor Carlos Caldas, senior group leader at the Cancer Research UK Cambridge Institute and co-lead author of the study, said, “We can use blood samples to track how breast cancer is progressing as fragments of DNA are shed by cancer cells when they die…The levels of tumor DNA are telling us how the cancer is responding to treatment.”
The study is published in the New England Journal of Medicine.
Source: Cancer Research UK.