Genetic screening tool can predict risk of leukemia, say researchers
TORONTO — Symptoms of acute myeloid leukemia tend to arise quite suddenly, but scientists have discovered signs of this aggressive, deadly form of blood cancer can be present many years earlier — providing hope for a treatment that could stop the disease from ever occurring.
A team of Canadian and international researchers has discovered a way of predicting if healthy individuals risk developing acute myeloid leukemia, or AML, up to a decade before its onset.
The findings, published Monday in the journal Nature, answer the question of where, when and how the disease begins, said John Dick, a senior scientist at Princess Margaret Cancer Centre in Toronto and a co-principal author of the study.
“We have been able to identify people in the general population who have traces of mutations in their blood that represent the first steps in how normal blood cells begin on a pathway of becoming increasingly abnormal and puts them at risk of progressing to AML,” said Dick.