It was during the Congress of the European Society of Medical Oncology, in Paris, that a study which seems promising was presented to the scientific community. The presence of tumor DNA in the blood (called ctDNA) might be identified and announce that the development of the disease is imminent. This signal is common to a large number of cancers: breast, pancreas, colon, lung, gastric, etc.
If this is confirmed, it is a real revolution that would allow us to intervene very early upstream. Whereas today we have to wait for the appearance of symptoms. Most often, the diagnoses are thus much too late to allow a total cure.
It should be noted that, if all people who have ctDNA do not necessarily have cancer, this tumor DNA is present in all those who develop one.