The simple blood draw that tests for 50 cancers long before symptoms develop
Mon, 08/26/2024 - 12:00
Each year, close to 20 million people around the world hear the words, “You have cancer.” Regular screening plays a vital role in early cancer detection and treatment, yet the uptake of such tests remains low. In Singapore, for example, a recent survey found that only about four in 10 women aged 50 to 69 regularly go for a mammogram.
Now, however, Singaporean precision medicine startup Lucence has developed a range of quick, non-invasive blood tests that can alert people to cancer DNA and different mutations for earlier cancer detection when potentially curable.
Two main ingredients power Lucence’s approach to beating cancer: a conviction that early detection and diagnosis are critical and a commitment to harnessing the most innovative technology.
The Singaporean startup’s company founder and CEO, Dr Tan Min-Han, first formulated his approach while working as a medical-oncologist consultant at the National Cancer Centre Singapore in 1999. He was struck by the number of late-stage cancer patients coming through his clinic’s doors. For many, it was too late to get help as the cancer was too far advanced.
Dr Tan also learned that many people avoided early cancer screening as they found tests such as colonoscopies invasive and painful.
Dr Tan in Lucence’s Singapore office.
“I knew that about 78 per cent of cancer deaths globally were occurring in cases where the cancer had not been screened for. I wondered, ‘What if we could come up with a way to make testing for the cancer’s hallmarks less invasive, faster and more accurate?” he says.
That put Dr Tan on a path to founding Lucence in 2016 with just five staff members. In 2018, the fledgling company introduced its flagship offering, LiquidHALLMARK, a liquid biopsy test that detects clinically relevant mutations across multiple cancer types. While initially profiling 20 genes in blood, LiquidHALLMARK has been expanded to cover 80 genes across 15 types of cancer.
In May 2023, a second flagship product, LucenceINSIGHT, was launched in Asia. This used a single blood draw to check early signals for up to 50 types of cancer – including lung, breast and colorectal.
“We’re aiming to catch a wider range of cancers before the symptoms appear,” says Dr Tan.
Applying novel technology approaches
With just a single draw of blood from patients, Lucence’s technology detects a range of cancer ‘signals’ – biological substances shed by cancers, such as fragments of tumour DNA – that go beyond what traditional methods can pick up.
Testing begins with a physician drawing a blood sample from a patient in a clinic or hospital. The sample is stored in a kit and shipped to Lucence’s Singapore laboratory to be processed by its proprietary technology, AmpliMARK.