LAUSR

Advances in genomic technologies are revolutionizing how we understand pathogenesis in ovarian cancer. These technologies are critical in developing innovative strategies to diagnose cancer earlier by detecting rare mutant alleles or aberrant methylation marks among a pool of normal DNA. Studies integrating these technologies provide the fundamental scientific underpinning for designing future standards of care to reduce the burden of ovarian cancer through early detection and prevention. This presentation will focus on two related topics. One is to summarize the recent research findings from the Johns Hopkins Ovarian Cancer Early Detection (JHOCD) group in deciphering the major molecular alterations involving in ovarian cancer in situ lesions (serous tubal intraepithelial carcinoma, STIC) and its precursors (including serous tubal intraepithelial lesion, STIL and so-called “p53” signatures) in fallopian tubes. The clinicopathologic and molecular studies we have done have helped define the precursor lesions in many high-grade serous carcinomas (HGSC) of the ovary, the most common and aggressive type of ovarian epithelial cancer. The other focus is to discuss the promise and challenges in applying genetic and epigenetic methods to detect ovarian HGSC. In an effort to replicate the success of cervical cancer screening, several approaches for the early detection of ovarian cancers have been proposed. JHOCD team has first reported the feasibility of using cervical cytology samples to detect ovarian carcinomas. We have extended this original study by determining whether different sample collection methods including cervical cytology specimens, uterine lavage/brush, and blood, alone or in combination with each other or serum CA-125 levels, can achieve a better sensitivity and specificity. The objective of JHOCD is to facilitate the proposed clinical studies to assess the clinical benefit in applying the aforementioned molecular diagnostics for early ovarian cancer diagnosis in high-risk women (including those carrying BRCA mutations). Citation Format: Ie-Ming Shih. PapGene, PapSEEK, and PapDREAming for early detection of ovarian cancer. [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the AACR Conference: Addressing Critical Questions in Ovarian Cancer Research and Treatment; Oct 1-4, 2017; Pittsburgh, PA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Clin Cancer Res 2018;24(15_Suppl):Abstract nr IA16.