Molecular markers – Ronny Allan – Living with Neuroendocrine Cancer

12Sep 2021 by Ronny Allan 1 Comment

The GRAIL multi-cancer early detection test study

Edit 13th Aug 2021. Major Announcement from UK. The NHS will today launch the world’s largest trial of a revolutionary new blood test that can detect more than 50 types of cancer before symptoms appear. The first people to take part will have blood samples taken at mobile testing clinics in retail parks and other convenient community locations. The Galleri(tm) test checks for the earliest signs of cancer in the blood and the NHS-Galleri trial, the first of its kind, aims to recruit 140,000 volunteers in eight areas of England to see how well the test works in the NHS. Read more here. "The earlier that cancer can be found, the higher the chance of successful treatment and survival. Yet, too often cancer goes undetected until it has progressed…

13Dec 2020 by Ronny Allan 2 Comments

Selecting patients and the Challenges of Evaluating Response to PRRT in GEPNETs: The Present and the Future

Clinical Trials, Patient Advocacy, Treatment

Share on facebook Facebook Share on twitter Twitter Share on pinterest Pinterest Share on whatsapp WhatsApp Share on email Email Fascinating article from the Italian NET scientific community. This article is more than just what the title says, it provides overviews on many facets of NETs including markers, scans and PRRT itself. It covers how to select patients for PRRT in the first place, i.e. who is most likely to get a good response to this treatment and then look at how to track and assess that response. The important thing I gathered from reading is that none of this is a precise science, there are too many variables. And while this article focusses on the clinical factors, there can of course be non-clinical factors in play in different countries…

11Jul 2020 by Ronny Allan 5 Comments

The NETest® – a Chromogranin A replacement and more?

Clinical Trials, Patient Advocacy

Tumour Markers GeneralFor some years the gold standard tumour marker for Neuroendocrine Neoplasms (NENs) has been and remains today, Chromogranin A (and for certain scenarios Chromogranin B and C can provide some additional clues). Pancreastatin, which is actually a molecule of Chromogranin A, is another marker touted but appears to be limited to USA. Its main advantage is the ability to better handle the effects of Proton Pump Inhibitor (PPI) use which is prevalent in the general population. As we move to a new era of molecular/genetic tumour markers, there's a danger that NENs will be left behind, stuck with diagnostic tools not capable of meeting new demands. I see a lot of public criticism of Chromogranin A, but it's mainly directed at the problem of being skewed by the use…

09May 2019 by Ronny Allan 5 Comments

The Heterogeneity of Grade 3 (High grade) Neuroendocrine Neoplasms

Awareness, Patient Advocacy

Reviewed and updated 14th March 2022High Grade - the forgotten patient group?When reading articles in the mainstream media, found in medical publications; and even listening to doctors speak about my disease, it's clear that the focus is on the term "Neuroendocrine Tumours" or NET for short. Many websites of advocate foundation organisations and specialist scientific organisations, all still use the term "NET" in their naming. I too am guilty of having a large Facebook site falling into this category. It's little wonder that those with high grade disease can often feel like the forgotten patient group. Clearly all the aforementioned organisations support all patients regardless of grade, but it's true to say that the naming and general use of terminology continues to fall behind. It's also true that the term…

19May 2017 by Ronny Allan 5 Comments

ASCO 2017 – Let’s talk about NETs #ASCO17

Clinical Trials

ASCO (American Society of Clinical Oncology) is one of the biggest cancer conferences in the world normally bringing together more than 30,000 oncology professionals from around the world to discuss state-of-the-art treatment modalities, new therapies, and ongoing controversies in the field. As Neuroendorine Tumors is on a roll in terms of new treatments and continued research, we appear to be well represented with over 20 'extracts' submitted for review and display. This is fairly complex stuff but much of it will be familiar to many. I've filtered and extracted all the Neuroendocrine stuff into one list providing you with an easy to peruse table of contents, complete with relevant linkages if you need to read more. For many the extract title and conclusion will be sufficiently educational or at least…

28Sep 2016 by Ronny Allan 23 Comments

Neuroendocrine Cancer – tumour markers and hormone levels

Patient Advocacy

BackgroundI think most people have had a form of medical testing at some point in their life, i.e. the sampling and testing of blood, urine, saliva, stool or body tissue. In a nutshell, the medical staff are just measuring the content of a 'substance' and then taking a view whether this is normal or not based on pre-determined ranges. These tests are normally done as a physician's reaction to symptom presentation or maintenance/surveillance of an existing diagnosed condition. Sometimes, abnormal results will lead to more specialist tests.In cancer, these tests are frequently called 'markers'. Most tumour markers are made by normal cells as well as by cancer cells; however, they are produced at much higher levels in cancerous conditions. These substances can be found in the blood, urine, stool, tumour tissue,…