Understanding Raman signatures in colorectal cancer

Background and study aims
Bowel cancer is one of the commonest cancers worldwide. Early diagnosis is vital for improving outcomes but challenging as symptoms are not specific and are common to other non-cancer conditions. The current gold standard for diagnosis of bowel cancer is colonoscopy. However, colonoscopy is not without risk and services are under huge pressure due to increasing demand causing long waiting times for the patients who need it most. In collaboration with Swansea University, we have developed a blood test that works by shining a laser light onto a blood sample and measuring how much light is scattered off molecules in that sample. This creates a unique ‘fingerprint’ result that is specific to cancer. Our early results show that the test is very good at identifying patients with a high likelihood of having bowel cancer. We aim to understand the underlying causes of the differences between the blood sample fingerprints measured in patients with and without bowel cancer. By better understanding the origin of the signals, the accuracy of the test could be improved, leading to better cancer detection. The study will achieve this by tracking the patterns measured in the blood test from the blood samples back to the tumour. This will include investigating the role of the gut organisms that inhabit the bowel, the effect of the fasting state, lipids and bowel preparation on the results of the blood test.
Who can participate?
Adult participants with a diagnosis of bowel cancer, significant bowel disease requiring an operation, patients who undergo routine lipid, or procedures requiring bowel preparation and control participants
What does the study involve?
Participants will undergo blood tests and provide faecal samples. For patients having an operation as part of their care, a small portion of tissue that has been removed will be studied.