Guardant Health, a leading precision oncology company headquartered in California, announced Monday that it has launched its blood-based colorectal cancer screening test, Shield, in collaboration with Samsung Medical Center in Korea.
Guardant Health’s Shield test, which can be used for regular colorectal cancer (CRC) screening, can detect cancer in its early stages by analyzing circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA), which is produced when tumors shed small pieces of their genetic material into the bloodstream.
In the Eclipse study, which enrolled over 20,000 patients, the Shield test achieved 83 percent sensitivity for detecting colorectal cancer in average-risk adults in the U.S., with specificity of 90 percent.
Early detection is essential to reduce colorectal cancer mortality. Colonoscopy and fecal tests are generally used for early detection, however, compliance rates for these screening tests are low and have remained stagnant since 2014.
The primary reasons for lack of compliance with CRC screening recommendations include not having any symptoms of CRC, lack of time for a colonoscopy procedure, which requires a few days of preparation, and fear of an invasive colonoscopy procedure.
Since the launch of the lab-developed version of the Shield test in May 2022, it has shown a patient adherence rate of approximately 90 percent, demonstrating that blood-based tests can help prevent not being tested for colorectal cancer screening in time.
“Colorectal cancer rarely has symptoms in its early stages, and by the time symptoms appear, the disease has often progressed considerably. Therefore, early detection through a screening test is critical,” said the Health Promotion Center of Samsung Medical Center. “The Shield blood test can broaden the range of choices for colorectal cancer screening. We are confident that by introducing a high-quality blood-based screening test, we can meet the needs of both patients and healthcare providers and help improve screening compliance.”
“We are pleased to be able to help address the high rates of colorectal cancer in South Korea by introducing the Shield test at Samsung Medical Center,” said Simranjit Singh, Chief Executive Officer of Guardant Health Asia, Middle East & Africa. “We are confident that this revolutionary screening test will help healthcare professionals detect colorectal cancer early, when it’s most treatable, with a simple blood draw.”
According to the National Cancer Information Center (NCIC) and Statistics Korea, Colorectal cancer is one of the most commonly diagnosed cancers and the third-leading cause of cancer-related deaths in South Korea.