To diagnose lung cancer, tumor tissue is collected from a patient and checked for signs of cancer. However, this is not always possible due to tumor location, and can be painful for the patient. For his PhD research, Remco de Kock worked on a liquid biopsy approach based on the PCR method to search for tumor biomarkers in the blood of patients suspected of having lung cancer. It’s minimally invasive, patient friendly, and proves very effective. He defends his thesis on December 14th at the department of Biomedical Engineering.
Proper diagnosis of lung cancer relies on the collection of a lung tumor tissue biopsy, but this is not always possible and can be painful for the patient.
One way to skip this is the use of so-called liquid biopsies. Put simply, a blood sample from a patient is analyzed for biomarkers associated with tumors. For his PhD research, Remco de Kock’s studied the use of liquid biopsy in diagnosis and therapy monitoring of lung cancer patients.