Researchers at the University of Heidelberg have made a medical breakthrough: they have developed a blood test that reliably detects breast cancer.
For all cancers, the earlier the disease is discovered, the higher the chances of recovery. Therefore, the latest announcement of the doctors of Heidelberg University Hospital is a medical breakthrough: University director Professor Christof Sohn has announced, according to a report in the ” image ” that his team has developed a blood test that is to detect breast cancer as reliable as a mammogram. Unlike this examination, the blood test is not very costly and the patient does not have to expose herself to any radiation exposure.
Cancer is also reliably recognized in younger women
The so-called “Heiscreen” recognizes cancer before it becomes visible. “ On MRI, you only see tumors from 5 millimeters in size – but then there are already millions of cancer cells available,” says Sohn. If the cancer becomes visible on MRI, it may have already scattered. “The biggest advantage of the blood test: it reacts very sensitively, especially in women under 50 years, has here a marksmanship of 86 percent,” the physician continues.
Help also in the fight against ovarian cancer
The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that around one million women develop breast cancer every year – in Germany alone there are around 70,000. And more women die from cancer than from breast cancer. But not only in the fight against this disease, the blood test could save many lives in the future: according to Christof son , the test can also detect the particularly aggressive applicable ovarian cancer with similar high reliability. This is also very good news because there is no suitable precautionary measure against ovarian cancer.
Update: Health insurance companies do not pay blood test
The newly developed “Heiscreen” blood test will not be paid for the time being by the health insurance companies. The reason: The funds pay basically only tests that have the so-called CE mark. However, this has already been applied for the blood test.