Biomarkers to Improve CT Screening for Early Cancer in Veterans
Abstract
Lung cancer is the number one cancer killer in Veterans. Because finding lung cancer at its early stages by low-dose computed tomography (LDCT) can reduce the related deaths, LDCT is now used for the early detection of lung cancer. However, LDCT increases the number of indeterminate pulmonary nodules (PNs), whereas 95% of the PNs are finally false positives, leading to the false-positive rate and over-treatments. Therefore, there is an unmet need to precisely distinguish malignant from benign PNs in positive LDCT findings and, hence, reduce the over-diagnosis and over-treatments. We have focused on the development of noninvasive biomarkers for lung cancer for almost two decades. Particularly, from our prior IDA, we have developed a biomarker panel that has 92% sensitivity and 92% specificity for detection of lung cancer, regardless of the types and stages of lung tumors and smoking status of the individuals. The objective of our expansion award application is to further characterize the promising biomarkers and then bring them to the clinics for specifically distinguishing between malignant and benign PNs in Veterans, and thus precisely identify lung cancer at the earl stages in Veterans. Our project will address the following areas of research emphasis of DOD. 1. Identify or develop noninvasive or minimally invasive tools to improve detection of the initial stages of lung cancer. 2. Identify, develop, and/or build upon already existing tools for screening or early detection of lung cancer. 3. Identify innovative strategies for prevention and treatment of early and/or localized lung cancer. After the completion of this project, the biomarker panel will be ready to be used in the clinics for the Veterans who have indeterminate PNs. The biomarker panel will complement LDCT screening for lung cancer by excluding positive LDCT cases that are actually negative for lung cancer. Its future use will spare Veterans with benign growths from harmful diagnostics and therapeutics and enable treatments to be instantly initiated for lung cancer and thus reduce the mortality. Furthermore, since the biomarkers can detect lung cater at the early stage, independent of the smoking status of the individuals, the biomarkers could be used for the early detection of lung cancer among both smokers and nonsmokers. Therefore, the success of the study will help eradicate deaths from lung cancer and improve the health and welfare of Veterans.
Document Details
- Document Type
- DoD Grant Award
- Publication Date
- Dec 28, 2022
- Source ID
- W81XWH2210779
Entities
People
- Feng Jiang
Organizations
- United States Army
- University of Maryland, Baltimore