Glowing poop: McMaster researchers developing colorectal cancer test

Researchers from McMaster University in Hamilton are working on what they call simple, non-invasive test for colorectal cancer: glowing poop.

Biochemist Dr. Yingfu Li and gastroenterologist Dr. Bruno Salena say the test they’re developing under a grant from the Canadian Cancer Society is an innovative way to get more people checked for cancer.

“I find it very exciting as a clinician,” Salena said. “If we can produce a simple, cost-effective test here, the costs for a population are much less all around.”

To start the study, researchers are amassing a pool of as many as a quadrillion DNA sequences. With this massive pool, they plan to search for specific DNA enzymes that will glow in the feces of people with colorectal cancer. If they’re successful, the detection tool could one day be used in the doctor’s office as a simple, inexpensive test for cancer, CBC News reports.

Colorectal cancer is the second leading cause of cancer deaths for men in Canada, behind lung cancer, and the third-leading cause of death among women, behind lung and breast cancer, according to Canadian Cancer Statistics 2014.

But doctors say when colon cancer is caught early, it’s 90 per cent treatable.

There are currently two at-home tests that can detect tiny amounts of blood in stool samples when cancer is present, but they can produce many false positives.

A colonoscopy is a more accurate test, but it’s invasive, expensive and not recommended for the general population until age 50, doctors say.

Salena says researchers have already studied 30 colorectal cancer patients’ stool samples, and by next summer, they should have a panel of molecules that can be tested alongside them.

If the test works, there’s no reason the same system couldn’t be implemented to test other types of cancer, Salena says, like using a glowing urine sample to find prostate cancer.

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