14 DAY TRIAL // A cost-effective saliva test that may reveal the presence of oral cancer is currently being developed by a group of investigators in the United States. This simple approach could potentially reduce the number of lives that are lost every single year to the sixth most common form of cancer affecting the country.
Michigan State University Health Team physician Barry Wenig, the director of otolaryngology, head and neck surgery, and a professor in the College of Human Medicine's Department of Surgery, is working with the Research and Data Institute's Delta Denta dental benefits firm for this project.
Together, experts are now compiling a large database of information on this condition, its causes and its symptoms, as well as its development over time. A number of dentists are also being recruited for patient studies. Researchers want to enroll between 100 and 200 people in their trials.
Scientists at the University of California in Los Angeles (UCLA) have recently identified a series of oral cancer biomarkers in saliva, and so the MSU team is trying to find a way of creating a test that would detect even small concentrations of these chemicals in human saliva.
In addition to revealing the patients that require immediate attention, the test would also indicate the individuals who do not need to be subjected to needless and invasive biopsy procedures.
“Most white lesions are benign, so a majority of people who develop them are getting biopsies that are not needed. Conversely, a simple test would allow us to identify those patients with malignant lesions and get them into treatment quicker,” Wenig explains.
He adds that only 60 percent of patients diagnosed with oral cancer live for more than 5 years after diagnostics, primarily because the tumors are usually detected very late in their evolution. Statistics show that only 38 percent of Black males survive for more than 5 years.
“The key challenge to reduce the mortality and morbidity of oral cancer is to develop strategies to identify and detect the disease when it is at a very early stage,” Wenig goes on to say. Clinical trials with the US Food and Drug Administration are also planned for the new tests, he adds.
“The results of this trial could be life changing for many people. It is a tremendous opportunity for the dental community to participate in what could be a groundbreaking research project,” concludes Delta Dental chief science officer, Jed Jacobson.