Effective Lung Cancer Screening -- Only a Breath Away

Here's a fascinating article about a novel way of screening for and detecting the presence of lung cancer in patients.

Researchers at the University of Colorado Cancer Center and Nobel-Prize-winning Technion University in Haifa, Israel have developed a device that uses gold nanoparticles to trap and define molecules in exhaled breath of patients. The theory is that the metabolism in lung cancer patients is different than that of healthy patients; and, the researchers claim, so are the molecules in the patients' exhaled breath.

The device can take in those molecules. They can then be analyzed to control groups. Finally, scientists and doctors could tell if the molecules indicate a cancerous lung or not.

What's great about this is not only how easy and potentially cost-saving this is but also how much you can tell about the patient from these molecules. They can also determine subsets of lung cancer that the patient has and which specific regimen of treatment will work. The patient can also breath later on into the device again and see if the treatment is helping.

One day, as the author mentions, a person can be walking around a grocery store, and while he or she is checking out or getting his or her blood pressure measured, he or she can blow in a bag and get screened for lung cancer at little to no charge.

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/releases/237913.php