MRI is currently used in Australia for the screening of breast cancer or ovarian cancer. Breast cancer uses mammography and/or ultrasound and ovarian cancer generally uses ultrasound. Not sure what they do overseas.
Yes- you can pick up cancer cells earlier with Magsense, but only if the cancer displays the particular receptor being used. Maybe it would still be better than our crude imaging tests which simply look for a mass at the moment. Nevertheless, implementation of a screening test has to way up the costs and benefits of any testing strategy. Epidemiologists look at things like the NNT (number needed to treat) in addition to the sensitivity and specificity of the test in order to determine what the best test would be. Might still be magsense, but it probably wouldn’t be in the early stages. Presumably a magsense scan is going to be more expensive that an ultrasound! So the utility of screening using magsense is up for debate- not saying it won’t happen, but it’s certainly not a given.
What about searching for mets in an established cancer? There’s nothing besides PET or a pan CT for this at the moment. Surely implementing Magsense here would be a total game changer! I think this is where the money is.
I do agree with you that the likelihood of acquisition is probably high if we have positive trial results. Will be interesting to see what happens over the next several years.
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