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Lancet Study Finds Urgent Need for Improvement in Clinical Laboratory Prostate Cancer Screening Worldwide

Sep 18, 2024 | Digital Pathology, International Laboratory News, Laboratory Pathology, Laboratory Resources, Laboratory Testing, Precision Medicine

Ongoing increases in the global number of prostate cancer cases expected to motivate test developers to deliver better screening tests to pathologists and clinical lab scientists

No less an authority than the peer-reviewed healthcare journal The Lancet is drawing attention to predictions of increasing prostate cancer cases across the globe, triggering calls for the development of cheaper, faster, and more accurate assays that pathologists and medical laboratories can use to screen for—and diagnose—prostate cancer.

Swift population growth and rising life expectancy will cause the prostate cancer death rate to nearly double in the next 20 years, according to a new study that has led scientists to call for immediate, critical improvements in clinical laboratory testing for cancer screening, Financial Times (FT) reported.

The International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) partnered with The Lancet Commission for the study. They found the strongest need is with underserved populations.

“Low- and middle-income countries need to prepare to prevent a sharp rise in fatalities while richer nations should pay more attention to young men at higher risk of the disease,” FT noted. The study, titled, “The Lancet Commission on Prostate Cancer: Planning for the Surge in Cases,” predicts cases will jump from 1.4 million in 2020 to 2.9 million by 2040.

“Prostate cancer is the most common cancer in men in 112 countries, and accounts for 15% of cancers. In this Commission, we report projections of prostate cancer cases in 2040 on the basis of data for demographic changes worldwide and rising life expectancy. … This surge in cases cannot be prevented by lifestyle changes or public health interventions alone, and governments need to prepare strategies to deal with it,” the study authors wrote.

“The findings in this Commission provide a pathway forward for healthcare providers and funders, public health bodies, research funders, governments, and the broader patient and clinical community,” the authors noted. In their Lancet paper, the researchers define clear areas for improvement.

Given the shortage worldwide of pathologists—especially highly-trained pathologists—the gap between the demand/need for expanded prostate cancer testing as screens (along with prostate biopsies) and the available supply of pathologists will encourage companies to develop screening and diagnostic tests that are accurate and automated, thus increasing the productivity of the available pathologists.

“As more and more men around the world live to middle and old age, there will be an inevitable rise in the number of prostate cancer cases. We know this surge in cases is coming, so we need to start planning and take action now,” said Nick James, PhD (above), Professor of Prostate and Bladder Cancer Research at The Institute of Cancer Research, in a press release. Pathologists and medical laboratories worldwide will want to monitor progress of The Lancet Commission’s recommendations. (Photo copyright: Institute of Cancer Research.)

Focus on Outreach, AI, Research/Development

“The only thing you can do to mitigate the damage … is to set up programs that diagnose it earlier to allow earlier treatment,” Nick James, PhD, The Lancet Commission study’s lead author, told the Financial Times. James is Professor of Prostate and Bladder Cancer Research at The Institute of Cancer Research (IRC) and The Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust, London.

“Evidence-based interventions, such as improved early detection and education programs, will help to save lives and prevent ill health from prostate cancer in the years to come. This is especially true for low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) which will bear the overwhelming brunt of future cases,” he said in a press release.

Communication is key. “Improved outreach programs are needed to better inform people of the key signs to look out for and what to do next,” James N’Dow, MD, Professor and Chair in Surgery and Director of the Academic Urology Unit at the University of Aberdeen in the UK, told the Financial Times. “Implementing these in tandem with investments in cost-effective early diagnostic systems will be key to preventing deaths,” he added.

Capitalizing on artificial intelligence (AI) analysis to help translate results was another area The Lancet Commission researchers focused on, Financial Times noted.

AI could “subdivide disease into potentially valuable additional subgroups to help with treatment selection. In environments with few or no pathologists, these changes could be transformational,” the study authors wrote.

High Income Countries (HICs) would benefit from AI by empowering patients. “Linking cloud-based records to artificial intelligence systems could allow access to context-sensitive, up-to-date advice for both patients and health professionals, and could be used to drive evidence-based change in all settings,” the study authors added. Such a trend could lead to specialist prostate cancer pathologists being referred cases from around the world as digital pathology systems become faster and less expensive.

Effective treatment strategies and bolstering areas of need is also key, the study notes. “Many LMICs have urgent need for expansion of radiotherapy and surgery services,” the study authors wrote. The researchers stress the need to immediately implement expansion programs to keep up with anticipated near-future demand.

Cancer drug therapy should follow suit.

“Research and the development of risk-stratified regulatory models need to be facilitated,” the study authors noted, citing a focus on drug repurposing and dose de-escalation. “Novel clinical trial designs, such as multi-arm platforms, should be supported and expanded,” they added.

Unique Needs of LMICs, HICs

The Lancet Commission researchers’ recommendations shift depending on the financial health of a specific area. HICs are experiencing a 30-year decline in the number of deaths resulting from prostate cancer, presumably from additional testing measures and public health campaigns that may be lacking in LMICs, Financial Times reported. And as population growth soars, low-to-middle income populations “will need to be prepared for the strain the expected surge in cases will put on health resources.”

For HICs, the study dissected the limitations of prostate-specific antigen (PSA) testing. The researchers pointed out that PSA’s inaccuracies in screening symptomless patients can pinpoint “cancers that may never cause symptoms and need no treatment,” Financial Times reported.

Missing high-risk cases was also a cause for concern. “Diagnostic pathways should be modified to facilitate early detection of prostate cancer while avoiding overdiagnosis and overtreatment of trivial disease,” the study notes.

Screenings for high-risk younger men, and continuing public campaigns about prostate cancer, should be a focus for HICs, the study authors noted. “These would include people who have a family history of the disease, are of African ancestry, or carry a genetic mutation known as BRCA2,” Financial Times reported.

While the undertaking may sound intimidating—there is already such a heavy impact worldwide from prostate cancer—the researchers are optimistic of their recommendations.

“Options to improve care are already available at moderate cost. We found that late diagnosis is widespread worldwide, but especially in LMICs, where it is the norm. Early diagnosis improves prognosis and outcomes, and reduces societal and individual costs, and we recommend changes to the diagnostic pathway that can be immediately implemented,” the study authors wrote.

What Comes Next

“More research is needed among various ethnic groups to expand understanding of prostate cancer beyond the findings from studies that were largely based on data from white men,” The Lancet Commission told the Financial Times.

Astute pathologists and medical laboratories will want to monitor efforts to develop assays that are inexpensive, more accurate, and produce faster answers. Demand for these tests will be substantial—both in developed and developing nations.

—Kristin Althea O’Connor

Related Information:

Prostate Cancer Rise Sparks Call for Overhaul of Testing

The Lancet Commission on Prostate Cancer: Planning for the Surge in Cases

Lancet Commission Predicts Sharp Increase in Global Prostate Cancer Cases

The Lancet: Prostate Cancer Cases Expected to Double Worldwide Between 2020 and 2040, New Analysis Suggests

Prostate Cancer Cases Might Rise to 3 Million Globally by 2040

UK Study Claims AI Reading of CT Scans Almost Twice as Accurate at Grading Some Cancers as Clinical Laboratory Testing of Sarcoma Biopsies

Mar 8, 2024 | International Laboratory News, Laboratory Instruments & Laboratory Equipment, Laboratory Pathology, Laboratory Resources, Laboratory Testing, Precision Medicine

Radiological method using AI algorithms to detect, locate, and identify cancer could negate the need for invasive, painful clinical laboratory testing of tissue biopsies

Clinical laboratory testing of cancer biopsies has been the standard in oncology diagnosis for decades. But a recent study by the Institute of Cancer Research (ICR) and the Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust in the UK has found that, for some types of sarcomas (malignant tumors), artificial intelligence (AI) can grade the aggressiveness of tumors nearly twice as accurately as lab tests, according to an ICR news release.

This will be of interest to histopathologists and radiologist technologists who are working to develop AI deep learning algorithms to read computed tomography scans (CT scans) to speed diagnosis and treatment of cancer patients.

“Researchers used the CT scans of 170 patients treated at The Royal Marsden with the two most common forms of retroperitoneal sarcoma (RPS)—leiomyosarcoma and liposarcoma—to create an AI algorithm, which was then tested on nearly 90 patients from centers across Europe and the US,” the news release notes.

The researchers then “used a technique called radiomics to analyze the CT scan data, which can extract information about the patient’s disease from medical images, including data which can’t be distinguished by the human eye,” the new release states.

The scientists published their findings in The Lancet Oncology titled, “A CT-based Radiomics Classification Model for the Prediction of Histological Type and Tumor Grade in Retroperitoneal Sarcoma (RADSARC-R): A Retrospective Multicohort Analysis.”

The research team sought to make improvements with this type of cancer because these tumors have “a poor prognosis, upfront characterization of the tumor is difficult, and under-grading is common,” they wrote. The fact that AI reading of CT scans is a non-invasive procedure is major benefit, they added.

Christina Messiou, MD

“This is the largest and most robust study to date that has successfully developed and tested an AI model aimed at improving the diagnosis and grading of retroperitoneal sarcoma using data from CT scans,” said the study’s lead oncology radiologist Christina Messiou, MD, (above), Consultant Radiologist at The Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust and Professor in Imaging for Personalized Oncology at The Institute of Cancer Research, London, in a news release. Invasive medical laboratory testing of cancer biopsies may eventually become a thing of the past if this research becomes clinically available for oncology diagnosis. (Photo copyright: The Royal Marsden.)

Study Details

RPS is a relatively difficult cancer to spot, let alone diagnose. It is a rare form of soft-tissue cancer “with approximately 8,600 new cases diagnosed annually in the United States—less than 1% of all newly diagnosed malignancies,” according to Brigham and Women’s Hospital.

In their published study, the UK researchers noted that, “Although more than 50 soft tissue sarcoma radiomics studies have been completed, few include retroperitoneal sarcomas, and the majority use single-center datasets without independent validation. The limited interpretation of the quantitative radiological phenotype in retroperitoneal sarcomas and its association with tumor biology is a missed opportunity.”

According to the ICR news release, “The [AI] model accurately graded the risk—or how aggressive a tumor is likely to be—[in] 82% of the tumors analyzed, while only 44% were correctly graded using a biopsy.”

Additionally, “The [AI] model also accurately predicted the disease type [in] 84% of the sarcomas tested—meaning it can effectively differentiate between leiomyosarcoma and liposarcoma—compared with radiologists who were not able to diagnose 35% of the cases,” the news release states.

“There is an urgent need to improve the diagnosis and treatment of patients with retroperitoneal sarcoma, who currently have poor outcomes,” said the study’s first author Amani Arthur, PhD, Clinical Research Fellow at The Institute of Cancer Research, London, and Registrar at The Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust, in the ICR news release.

“The disease is very rare—clinicians may only see one or two cases in their career—which means diagnosis can be slow. This type of sarcoma is also difficult to treat as it can grow to large sizes and, due to the tumor’s location in the abdomen, involve complex surgery,” she continued. “Through this early research, we’ve developed an innovative AI tool using imaging data that could help us more accurately and quickly identify the type and grade of retroperitoneal sarcomas than current methods. This could improve patient outcomes by helping to speed up diagnosis of the disease, and better tailor treatment by reliably identifying the risk of each patient’s disease.

“In the next phase of the study, we will test this model in clinic on patients with potential retroperitoneal sarcomas to see if it can accurately characterize their disease and measure the performance of the technology over time,” Arthur added.

Importance of Study Findings

Speed of detection is key to successful cancer diagnoses, noted Richard Davidson, Chief Executive of Sarcoma UK, a bone and soft tissue cancer charity.

“People are more likely to survive sarcoma if their cancer is diagnosed early—when treatments can be effective and before the sarcoma has spread to other parts of the body. One in six people with sarcoma cancer wait more than a year to receive an accurate diagnosis, so any research that helps patients receive better treatment, care, information and support is welcome,” he told The Guardian.

According to the World Health Organization, cancer kills about 10 million people worldwide every year. Acquisition and medical laboratory testing of tissue biopsies is both painful to patients and time consuming. Thus, a non-invasive method of diagnosing deadly cancers quickly, accurately, and early would be a boon to oncology practices worldwide and could save thousands of lives each year.

—Kristin Althea O’Connor

Related Information:

AI Twice as Accurate as a Biopsy at Grading Aggressiveness of Some Sarcomas

AI Better than Biopsy at Assessing Some Cancers, Study Finds

AI Better than Biopsies for Grading Rare Cancer, New Research Suggests

A CT-based Radiomics Classification Model for the Prediction of Histological Type and Tumor Grade in Retroperitoneal Sarcoma (RADSARC-R): A Retrospective Multicohort Analysis

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