Research could lead to more precise diagnosis and treatment of ovarian cancer

MICHAEL BROWN - 07 May 2019

Newly found biomarkers 99 per cent accurate at differentiating between two types of ovarian cancer, according to U of A researcher.

Oncologists may soon have an accurate and inexpensive way of differentiating between types of ovarian cancer that will improve how patients are treated, thanks to findings from a national research study co-led out of the University of Alberta.

"One of the issues with ovarian cancer is that we cannot fully decipher between subtypes," said Lynne Postovit, U of A oncology researcher and co-director of the Cancer Research Institute of Northern Alberta. "This is an important problem because the different subtypes should be treated differently."

She explained that women with endometrioid-type ovarian carcinoma usually have a better prognosis for beating the disease and need a less aggressive treatment than women suffering from high-grade serous carcinomas, which is the most common and deadly form of ovarian cancer.

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