A new swab test could help hundreds of thousands of women a year in the UK who may have womb cancer avoid having an often painful invasive procedure to detect the disease.
About 800,000 women annually go to see a GP because they are suffering from abnormal bleeding from their uterus and then undergo uncomfortable and stressful investigations to identify the cause.
Most postmenopausal women who are bleeding a lot will have a transvaginal ultrasound scan, in which a scanner probe is inserted into their vagina to measure the thickness of their womb lining, as that is where most cases of womb cancer start. Many then go on to have an invasive further test called a hysteroscopy and a biopsy.
However, the new test is as accurate as an ultrasound scan in detecting the disease – the fourth commonest cancer in UK women – and cuts the number of false positives by 87%. About 10,600 women a year are diagnosed with it and diagnoses have risen by 60% since the 1990s.
Called the WID-easy test, it has been invented by Martin Widschwendter, a professor of women’s cancer at University College London’s EGA Institute for Women’s Health and the University of Innsbruck.
“The WID-easy test is the first test of its kind in the UK, using a simple swab method to detect womb cancer,” he said.
The test involves a woman over 45 who visits her doctor because of uterine bleeding having a swab taken from her vagina and then analysed using polymerase chain reaction testing. It looks at “tags” on the top of the woman’s DNA, which is known as DNA methylation.
UCL explained: “DNA from cancer cells has a particular pattern of DNA methylation, like a unique barcode, that can be specifically ‘scanned’ by the WID-easy test, and indicates if womb cancer is present or not.”
The test has been registered with the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA), which approves drugs and medical devices for use in the UK. Private medical clinics are already using it, as are health facilities in Austria and Switzerland.
If the NHS adopts the new test it could lead to women having womb cancer diagnosed, or ruled out, faster than at present, according to the Eve Appeal, which funded the research behind the test. Athena Lamnisos, the gynaecological cancer charity’s chief executive, said the swab test would be much easier for patients to undergo because “currently in the UK, the tests to investigate abnormal bleeding and check for womb cancer can cause stress and discomfort”.
The test has also been shown to be more accurate than ultrasound in diagnosing womb cancer in Black women, she added.
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Three-quarters of diagnoses of womb cancer are in women over the age of 55. Being overweight or obese, eating sugary and processed food, taking oestrogen-only HRT, not having children and having the menopause after 55 are among the risk factors.
Helen Hyndman, a senior nurse at the charity, added that women who were investigated for womb cancer often suffered stress and anxiety during the “awful” wait for the results. “The WID-test … will help speed up the process for patients and for many more women it will rule out womb cancer much sooner, bringing huge relief, reducing anxiety, waiting time and even pain.”
She hailed the breakthrough as “a great step forward” and urged the NHS to start using it. “Saving thousands of women from needing further investigations will not just benefit them, but will help reduce the burden on the NHS by avoiding extra appointments and diagnostic procedures such as hysteroscopies and biopsies.”
