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Researchers from the Universities of Oxford, Nottingham, Bournemouth and Glasgow Caledonian will lead the £2.2 million AMULET clinical study into the use of a new imaging technique for surveillance of liver cancer in patients with cirrhosis. Led by Dr Michael Pavlides (study chief investigator, Radcliffe Department of Medicine, University of Oxford), Professor Susan Francis (study lead technical investigator, University of Nottingham) and Associate Professor Jamie Franklin (study lead radiologist, Bournemouth University), the study is funded by the Efficacy and Mechanism Evaluation (EME) Programme, a partnership between the National Institute for Health and Care Research and the Medical Research Council. The team will compare non-contrast-enhanced magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to the standard of care ultrasound to assess which imaging technique is better for diagnosing liver cancer earlier.
Liver cancer incidence is increasing and by 2038-2040 there could be around 9,700 new diagnoses of liver cancer every year (Cancer Research UK). Most cases of liver cancer arise in people with liver cirrhosis. Therefore, people with cirrhosis undergo regular surveillance by ultrasound with the aim of detecting liver cancer earlier. The earlier that liver cancer is detected, the more likely that treatment will be successful. However, liver ultrasound has poor sensitivity in some patients meaning that early liver cancers can be missed.
Read the full story on the Oxford Centre for Early Cancer Detection (OxCODE) website.