‘Exciting' new ‘all-over' scan can detect tiny traces of cancer anywhere in the body
A whole-body MRI scan can detect tiny traces of myeloma, a deadly blood cancer, and could transform how patients are monitored, experts say.
3
3
The test is radiation-free and can flag hidden cancer cells in the body. This is the case even when blood tests, bone marrow biopsies and CT scans show no signs of disease.
Experts said that this scanning technique gives doctors an early warning of relapse and help guide future treatment plans.
Myeloma, also known as multiple myeloma, is a type of blood cancer that develops from plasma cells in the bone marrow.
Around 6,200 people are diagnosed with the condition each year in the UK.
Charity Myeloma UK estimates that there are around 33,000 people living with myeloma in the UK.
It can affect many parts of the body and is not curable, but treatment can keep it under control.
The Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust and The Institute of Cancer Research, London, trialled the technique on 70 patients undergoing stem cell transplants.
They were all given a whole-body MRI before and after the treatment.
Writing in the Blood Cancer Journal, experts said that one in three patients had signs of residual disease on whole-body MRI after treatment - which can be given to patients without the use of radiation.
Overall survival was also significantly shorter in those with positive MRI findings.
What is myeloma?
The Royal Marsden has already adopted the whole-body image technique and it could help shape cancer care for patients around the country in the future.
One patient under the treatment of the hospital described how the scanning technique "extended his life" and enabled him to "continue serving" the country.
Air Vice-Marshal Fin Monahan, chief fire officer for South Wales Fire and Rescue Service, was diagnosed with myeloma in 2009 while serving in the RAF.
He has since relapsed twice, but thanks to whole-body MRI scans, his cancer was detected much earlier than would have been possible with a traditional CT scan.
The father of three, 57, said: "With the constant threat of relapse, myeloma patients are in a long-term mental battle with this insidious disease.
"However, being part of the whole-body MRI scan study at the Royal Marsden allowed my cancer to be closely watched and resulted in me being treated sooner than I would have been under normal protocols.
3
"This not only extended my life but after diagnosis, I returned to flying jets and to active operational duties.
"I would eventually not be allowed to fly on medical grounds due to myeloma but paved the way to establishing the first training programme of Ukrainian forces in 2015 and I was called upon to run Nato air operations after the invasion of Ukraine.
"This cutting-edge treatment not only extended my life but allowed me to continue serving my country."
The 10 red flag symptoms of myeloma
Myeloma is an incurable blood cancer that occurs in the bone marrow.
Despite being the third most common type of blood cancer, myeloma is difficult to detect as symptoms are often linked to general ageing or minor conditions.
While it is incurable, myeloma is treatable in the majority of cases.
Treatment can lead to periods of remission but the cancer will inevitably come back.
Symptoms of myeloma:
Persistent or unexplained pain for more than four to six weeks, particularly in the back or ribs
Tiredness that doesn't improve with rest (fatigue)
Frequent or hard-to-clear infections
Easily broken bones or unexpected fractures
Experiencing either frequent urination or minimal to no urination
Swollen legs or abdomen
Nosebleeds or unexplained bleeding or bruising
Unexplained weight loss
Numbness in the feet, hands, or legs
Unexplained shortness of breath
Professor Christina Messiou from The Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust, said: "This study shows that whole-body MRI gives us valuable information about how well the myeloma has responded to treatment that other tests may miss.
"It's exciting that we now have a standardised, non-invasive imaging method that can be used across cancer centres.
"Whole-body MRI doesn't involve radiation or intravenous injections, which is important for patients who may require lifelong monitoring.
"This is an important step towards smarter and kinder precision diagnostics for patients with cancer"
Professor Martin Kaiser, also from The Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust, added: "Access to this gold-standard precision imaging with whole-body MRI has revolutionised care for myeloma patients.
"As the treatment options for myeloma increase and factors such as disease distribution across the body are increasingly understood as important to treatment response, the relevance of the whole-body MRI for personalising treatment will only increase over time."
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The Independent
12 minutes ago
- The Independent
Oasis comeback gig in Edinburgh expected to literally shake the earth
Oasis 's 2009 concert at Edinburgh 's Murrayfield Stadium has been identified as the most "ground-shaking" event at the venue in the past two decades. New seismic data analysis by the British Geological Survey (BGS) revealed the Gallagher brothers' last Scottish gig registered a peak power of 215.06Kw. This power output, more than double the next strongest event, is attributed to the movement of fans jumping and dancing in time to the music. The peak energy reading in 2009 coincided with Oasis taking the stage and performing "Rock 'N' Roll Star". With Oasis's highly anticipated comeback tour set for Murrayfield this weekend, experts suggest it could potentially top the previous seismic record.
Telegraph
13 minutes ago
- Telegraph
Australia proves we don't have to suffer under the NHS
If I had to summarise the NHS in two numbers, they would be 27 and 18. The first – £27.5bn – is the liability for botched maternity care since 2019, when our world-beating health system has left women and infants crippled or dead. The second, £18bn, is roughly the amount the NHS spent on maternity services over the same period. Read through the documents the NHS provides, and you will find the usual bland statements about 'avoidable errors' and 'devastating consequences' for mothers, children, families and 'the NHS staff involved'. Actual meaningful improvements are thin on the ground, with the Care Quality Commission rating two thirds of maternity units inspected as 'requires improvement' or 'inadequate' for safety. Perhaps more in line with health service thinking is a 2018 appeal from the chief executive of the NHS confederation to cut compensation for clinical negligence. It is an unfortunate observation that the scandal-ridden state of NHS maternity services isn't particularly unusual: in every field of care, the incompetence of the health service is killing people who would otherwise have had a chance at living. Over on social media, an appeal for Britons to share stories 'about the time the NHS tried to kill you' has now been viewed 3.7 million times in around 36 hours. Heartbreaking lists of dead siblings, dead children, lost limbs and botched surgeries have come rolling in. That almost everyone in Britain seems to have a story where the NHS has catastrophically screwed up their care, or the care of someone close to them, isn't a strange coincidence. Hard numbers show that the NHS, to put it bluntly, is awful. Infant mortality rates are 16pc higher in Britain than in peer countries. Breast cancer survival rates are well behind average. Fatality rates for heart attacks and strokes are higher. The UK's treatable mortality rate – the rate of deaths which could have been averted with better healthcare – is 69 per 100,000 people, adjusted for age. The equivalent rate in Australia, to pick an example not entirely at random, is 46 per 100,000. It would be tempting to say that this is a matter of NHS resources. The UK has fewer doctors for every 1,000 inhabitants (3.2) than the United States (3.6), Ireland (4.1) or Australia (4). We also lag behind Bulgaria (4.9), Russia (3.8), and Kazakhstan (4) among many others. We also have fewer CT and MRI scanners – roughly one fifth the level of Australia – and fewer hospital beds. But in financial terms, this wouldn't quite be right. Adjusted for price levels, we spend considerably more per person than countries like Japan, Italy and New Zealand, while performing far worse in terms of treatable deaths. And when the NHS does get resources, it wastes them. Productivity in the health service has slumped back to its level in 2012, with all the technological gains since then swallowed by the sheer inability of the organisation to change and adapt. The core problem is one the health service has been grappling with since its foundation. There are no real price signals – the GP contract is still largely based on the characteristics and number of patients on a practice's books, rather than on actual work done – and there is no market where patients choose between providers based on their successes and failures. It's certainly true that the resulting system is fair, in that it fails to treat rich and poor alike. But it's untrue to claim that it somehow avoids trade-offs between people when deciding who gets care. A fully private healthcare system allocates treatment based on your ability to pay. The British system, meanwhile, allocates it based on your ability to wait. The result is spiralling waiting lists, without the additional resources brought into the system that a monetary system provides. Moreover, a fully private system isn't the only alternative on offer. The US healthcare model has been used to scare the public for decades, trotted out every time NHS reform has been suggested. I've never seen the Australian system used as a scare tactic, and that's probably because British people know it works. The Australian model is a hybrid. There is universal insurance in the form of Medicare, and there is private insurance purchased from the market. Healthcare providers are a mix of public and private. High earners who don't choose to buy an 'appropriate level of private patient hospital cover' pay a tax surcharge of between 1pc and 1.5pc of their taxable income to encourage self-reliance. Far from following Lord Kinnock's call for tax raids on private healthcare, there's a system of tax rebates for those who take out policies. The result is a system that provides excellent, convenient healthcare. Patients on the 7.4 million NHS waiting list have been on it for an average of 95 days. The average patient in Australia goes from diagnosis to surgery within 46 days. It works for patients, who get better outcomes. It works for doctors, who are voting with their feet. Junior doctors, in particular, who face random allocation to training places and competition from overseas graduates, must be sorely tempted. And it certainly works for the taxpayer. Add up spending across the public and private sectors, and Australia spends a little under 10pc of its GDP on healthcare. Britain spends 11pc. One per cent of GDP might not sound like a huge amount, but it is. In a UK context, it's about £26bn a year: enough to cut roughly 4p off the basic rate of income tax, or cut your council tax bill by two thirds. Or, of course, it could close half of the £50bn black hole in the public finances that Sir Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves may need to backfill by the autumn. Healthcare is far from the only area where Britain has something to learn from its offspring. Australia has us whipped in living standards, government efficiency, taxation from income and fuel, pensions, and the rest. Once we've dealt with health, we could do a lot worse than sending our own Iwakura Mission down under to learn from our cousins. But first things first: let's kill the NHS before it kills us.
The Independent
42 minutes ago
- The Independent
One in five NHS doctors wants to leave UK
The General Medical Council (GMC) has warned that doctor retention in the UK is at risk, with 19 per cent considering working abroad. The primary reasons cited for doctors considering leaving are being 'treated better' in other countries and the prospect of better pay. This potential exodus threatens Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer 's pledge to reduce NHS waiting lists, specifically his target for 92 per cent of patients to be seen within 18 weeks by July 2029. The GMC's report also highlighted concerns about career progression, with one in three doctors feeling unable to advance, contributing to burnout and a higher likelihood of seeking work overseas. The warning comes amidst ongoing strike action by resident doctors over pay, with the British Medical Association (BMA) and Health Secretary Wes Streeting engaged in further negotiations.
