the amount of specific compounds that are linked to stomach cancer. Nanoarray analysis is accurate, simple and inexpensive, the researchers said.
“A large trial with thousands of patients, including people with stomach cancer or pre-cancer, is now underway in Europe,” Haick noted in the published online journal Gut.
Christine Metz, director of the laboratory of medicinal biochemistry at the Feinstein Institute for Medical Research in Manhasset, N.Y., said, “Stomach cancer is rare in the United States, so it’s difficult to do routine screening knowing that our screening method is endoscopy, which is an invasive test.”
Who will it help?
According to the American Cancer Society, about 24,590 cases of stomach cancer will be diagnosed this year in the United States, and some 10,720 people will die from the disease.
Developing a fast, inexpensive and accurate screening test using a patient’s breath is an “amazing improvement,” she said. “It can identify people at risk for stomach cancer who you would want to screen with endoscopy.”
Metz said people at risk