Gary Xiao, PhD, CGMB

Overview

Diagnosis of pancreatic cancer at its early stages can improve the mortality and morbidity rate of patients significantly after surgery. It is therefore an unmet to develop effective clinical methods for detection of pancreatic cancer, especially at early stages. MicroRNAs play a crucial role in tumorigenesis and metastasis, which can be developed as effective biomarkers for early diagnosis of cancer. A panel of cell-free miRNAs (cfmiRNAs) including miRs-24/30c/181c/23a identified in our group was previously reported of high sensitivity, specificity and accuracy for detection of pancreatic cancer at its early lesions. The panel of the cfmiRNAs has been proven to be highly effective in assisting the diagnosis of pancreatic cancer at its early stages through small clinical cohort held independently in three state-level hospitals in China. To further validate the efficacy of the panel, we intend to compare the detective accuracy, the sensitivity and the specificity of the panel of the cfmiRNAs to other diagnosis methods both in separation and combined, in the diagnosis of pancreatic cancer at its early stages. The targeted subjects will be used for cross validation to establish clinical operable diagnostic models, which will be further evaluated in a test set analysis in terms of the accuracy, the sensitivity and the specificity for detection of the disease, in order to develop a clinical utility model and to use directly for diagnosis of pancreatic cancer at its early stages.