In 2022, over 24k Aussie males were diagnosed with prostate cancer. One of the most commonly diagnosed cancers, it was also the third most common cause of cancer death in Australia in 2020. Its high prevalence and the cocktail of concerns that come with it have prompted the need for better diagnosis mechanisms than the existing prostate-specific antigen (PSA) testing. 

PSA testing has been around since the 1980s and has a tendency to produce false-positive results that might result in unnecessary surgeries making life worse. Only a quarter of the people that get high levels in PSA testing are found to actually have prostate cancer. 

Evidently, there’s a need to improve the tests’ accuracy and genetic risk assessment company Genetic Technologies (ASX: GTG) has been up to the challenge. It has come up with the geneType Prostate Cancer Risk Assessment Test. Instead of focusing on family history—as is the case with most tests, geneType also considers age, genetics and ethnicity when determining your prostate cancer risk. It has been designed for men aged between 30 and 85 years of age. 

What’s more, the Company has announced the publication of a research paper in “The Prostate” validating the utilisation of the geneType Prostate Cancer Risk Assessment Test in the identification of men who are at increased risk of this serious disease. The paper, entitled ‘Development and validation of a simple prostate cancer risk prediction model based on age, family history, and polygenic risk’, was authored by GTG’s scientific team including Dr Erika Spaeth, Dr Richard Allman, Dr Gillian Dite and Dr Nicholas Murphy.

GTG’s Director of Clinical & Medical Affairs, and an author on the paper, Dr Erika Spaeth, noted, “Risk awareness can inform decision‐making between clinicians and their patients enabling them to discuss the risks and benefits of PSA screening and ultimately lead to early diagnosis of Prostate Cancer”.  

According to the study conducted on a prospective cohort of nearly 200,000 men from the UK Biobank, the geneType Prostate Cancer Risk Assessment Test exhibited the ability to detect 23% more men who are at a high risk of developing prostate cancer than relying solely on family history. This indicates that geneType can facilitate a more focused approach to screening high-risk men for Prostate Specific Antigen (PSA), thus increasing the effectiveness of the PSA screening test.

PSA screening has been widely acknowledged for its significant contribution to boosting early detection rates and reducing late-stage metastatic cancer diagnoses. However, it has also led to the identification of indolent (non-aggressive) cancer, causing a rise in overdiagnosis and over-treatment cases. By incorporating the geneType Prostate Risk Assessment Test, a more precise and directed approach towards PSA screening could be adopted, potentially lowering the necessity for unnecessary medical interventions.

Besides prostate cancer, the geneType multi-risk assessment test covers a range of diseases for both men and women, with the latest additions including melanoma, pancreatic cancer and atrial fibrillation. 

In H1 FY23, the Company’s net loss shot up by over 40% to $5.4 million as revenue increased to $4.1 million. Its cash position was equally dismal, as its cash equivalents fell from $11.7 million in June 2022 to $5 million by December 2022. The Company expects to incur more losses and cash outflows in the foreseeable future as it invests in its R&D, but it is counting on the commercialisation of geneType to bring the money back eventually.

GTG’s dedication to the continuous scientific advancement of its geneType risk assessment tests is emphasized in the publication, which marks the fifth release in the past six months. The publication covers a range of diseases including ovarian cancer, cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes, as well as breast cancer (two publications) and prostate cancer.

Genetic Technologies was recently featured in an biotech report on cancer researchers advancing towards commercialisation. The full report can be downloaded here.