Ovarian cancer is the fifth leading cause of death for women and is also known as the "silent killer" because scientists earlier could not detect any symptoms until it progressed to an advanced stage.
By adding a blood test for the CA125 ovarian-cancer biomarker the symptom index can catch more than four out of five early ovarian cancers, the study's lead author, M. Robyn Andersen, an associate member of the Public Health Sciences Division at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle said in a press release. The blood test looked for proteins that may be higher than normal in some women with ovarian cancer but experts say more research is needed before recommending the test as a general screening measure.
According to researchers there are three basic symptoms namely bloating or increased abdominal size, pelvic or abdominal pain, eating difficulty or feeling full too quickly. Many women often experience all of these symptoms but if any of these symptoms started recently, within the last year, it needs to be taken seriously.
The study involved 254 healthy women at high-risk for ovarian cancer because of family history, as well as 75 women about to undergo surgery to remove an ovarian cancer.
More than 21,000 women are diagnosed with ovarian cancer annually, and more than 15,000 women die from the disease each year, according to the American Cancer Society (ACS). However only about 20 percent of ovarian cancers are caught in their earliest curable stages.
