Finding colorectal cancers, usually the job of a colonscopy, may be done by a simple lab test.

This week, Madison, NJ-based Quest Diagnostics announced its blood test for bowel cancers was available for sale (DM 11288).

The test, called ColoVantage, checks for circulating particles of a biomarker for colorectal cancers, the methylated Septin9 gene. Although Quest Diagnostics developed the test, they licensed the rights to use the biomarker from its discoverer, Epigenomics, a Berlin, Germany-based biotech company.

MORE TESTS

Quest believes the test will rope in more patients for colon cancer testing. Currently, according to Epigenomics, compliance rates for testing are low, with only 40 percent of Americans over 50 undergoing colonscopies once every decade, as recommended by doctors. Other tests, such as the fecal occult blood test, which looks for hidden traces of blood in the stool, and which requires patients to give up red meat, acid-heavy fruit and other foods that could disturb the test, also have low compliance rates, of about 12 percent per year.

"In the U.S., rates of testing for colorectal cancer are low, and by offering this test, we are hoping that physicians will have a new tool for motivating patients who have resisted colonscopies and other established tests in the past to receive the type of testing that they need," Wendy Bost, as spokeswoman for Quest, tells DOTmed News.

NOT FOR SCREENING

Currently, the test, also available in Europe through Epigenomics and Abbott, is only offered as an adjunct to care, possibly for patients squeamish about colonscopies, and not as a screening tool.

But that could change. Around two years ago, Epigenomics began the PRESEPT trial, which could provide the evidence required by the medical community to recommend the test for widespread screening of those over 50.

In PRESEPT, conducted at 32 centers in the U.S. and Europe, doctors looked at around 7,914 blood samples drawn from a normal population of adults who underwent screening colonscopies, seeing how well the blood test's results matched up to the colonscopy's findings.

The study, which wrapped up in December, is blind, so Epigenomics doesn't know the results yet, and has to wait for analysis by several independent labs.

"The results should be out very, very, very soon," Achim Plum, Ph.D., a geneticist and vice president of Epigenomics, tells DOTmed News.

HOW IT WORKS

The test works by detecting colorectal cancer's fingerprint on DNA, specifically the methylation of the Septin9 gene.

Dr. Plum explains that every cell type shuts off genes through chemical modification, often by adding methyl groups to the DNA. By using proprietary technology that analyzes DNA methylation on a genome-wide basis, Epigenomics found that methylation of the Septin9 gene was unique to colorectal cancers.

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