Improving The PSA Test For Screening Prostate Cancer

Visit the Karolinska Institutet biobank and their efforts to improve the prostate cancer PSA test using biomarkers, OpenArray technology, and the QuantStudio 12K Flex qPCR system.

Transcript:

KI BioBank is a core facility for Karolinska Institute that supports any of the medical research the institute undertakes. One of the large projects that we are doing prostate cancer study where we are looking to try to improve the PSA test. We are evaluating genotyping with QuantStudio together with another platform looking at six other biomarkers at the same time. Combining these genetic markers with the new protein markers we believe that that will be a better prostate cancer test that hopefully in the future can be used for prostate cancer screening. I envision that within two years we can use genotyping in routine for prostate cancer diagnosis together with other biomarkers and PSA. The KI BioBank helps the researchers convert lab science into things that can be used in healthcare, things that help us understand what makes us sick, and how we can treat diseases in a better way. The first time I learned about the QuantStudio was about one and a half year ago when we were looking for a new genotyping technology in our prostate cancer study. The important points when we were choosing genotyping technology was that they should be fast, reliable and that we could make it automatic and get the answers back within one or two days. In the process of choosing a genotyping technology, we evaluated two other techniques and platforms and at the end we chose QuantStudio because it was most reliable and quick. We investigated an array of genotyping platforms such as microarray based and mass spec based, however due to the quick turnaround time and reduced hands on time of running the OpenArray system we decided that the QuantStudio OpenArray platform was best for our high throughput, high turnaround needs. The QuantStudio has given us a simple reliable technology that we can use to apply to a large number of individuals to start to understand genetic risk factors for prostate cancer. With QuantStudio we’ve seen that we can easily and robustly look at genetic effects in disease. We will continue evaluating QuantStudio in the prostate cancer genotyping. It’s looking promising already and we see a future where we apply it to routinely, maybe even to other disease areas. The QuantStudio has the potential of being a genotyping technology that you can use in the clinic. I can see in the future that genotyping for different diseases like prostate cancer, breast cancer will be common in clinical routine labs around the world. My vision is that this Biobank will have a real impact on public health. We’re already starting to see signs of that with for instance multiple sclerosis study where we can start to identify which patients respond in the best way to a new drug treatment and which patients are not going to get any benefit this way we’ll make healthcare much more effective.