So cool - Blood test to spot cancer gets big boost from J&J

Saw that on the news last night. Sounds like it is about 3-4 years away from being available. Sure wish it was available now!
 
Or 25 years ago, when papa died of cancer, or 8 years ago when Nana died of cancer or 2 years ago when another Papa died of cancer, etc, etc.

In 10-15 years take a blood test and they will know if the cancer is coming before you even have it. I think they already can determine if you are likely to get it.

What I think is so cool is that they use a chip to isolate the cancer cell and keep it intact for testing.
 
Yes, heard about today on the radio - interviewing one of the MD's; incredible news with incredible promise for the future.
Thanks for posting.

Bob
 
nickao said:
In 10-15 years take a blood test and they will know if the cancer is coming before you even have it.
Click to expand...

Yes, so they have an excuse to put your health premiums up... [sad]
 
No just the opposite really.

Instead of a lot of intrusive expense tests this will be a simple 10.00 blood test. That just has to save millions. Plus, it will rule out a lot of other things docs do when they are not sure what to do. Instead of doing something and paying for it and finding out it does not work they can skip that and hopefully narrow down the right course of treatment to give in the first place. They can also check if what they are prescribing is working, the next day! This can help to  eliminate hundreds of tests, MRI, Xray, biopsy, etc, they do to see if a treatment is actually working. It will save costs on the front and rear end of care.

I only see this as really reducing costs myself.

 
So let's say you do a test that can pre-determine if you're likely to get cancer. The result comes back that you are more likely to get cancer at some point than the next person.

Do you really think your premiums won't rise?

BTW, this is kind of a tangent (sorry about that), I'm not saying this test isn't a good thing, it is.
 
No I don't, but getting into that is a big question, maybe to big for this forum?

A  train of thought on this could be that the insurance companies will save billions by not having to do invasive treatments. One point of this test is that many cancers caught early are much, much cheaper to deal with and some can even be cured, of course costing less in the long run.  In the future this technology may be used to prevent cancer as well, which will save billions too.

Lets just hope a test like this is not used in the way you propose.

I think we agree this is a cool technology though!
 
jonny round boy said:
Do you really think your premiums won't rise?
Click to expand...

It totally depends on the insurance policy and the law.  If it's a group policy, the premium won't rise regardless of the law.  And depending on the applicable law, the insurers might be prohibited from raising the premium.  Not saying whether that would be good, just saying that insurance is one of the most heavily regulated fields of business in the US, and surprisingly few people, perhaps especially legislators, see the unintended consequences of the regulations.

Regards,

John
 
Early detection = less costly and more effective treatment.

Great technology.  When can I get a test?
 
Wonderwino said:
Early detection = less costly and more effective treatment.

Great technology.  When can I get a test?
Click to expand...

With the government involved in approving this, I'm sure it'll be a good 10 years until this is available.  Hope I'm wrong.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top