An epidemic of womb cancer in New Zealand is being tackled by University of Auckland researchers.
Associate Professor Cherie Blenkiron and Dr Sandra Fitzgerald, who are affiliated with the University’s Centre for Cancer Research, are working to develop less invasive tests for womb cancer.
“Specialists at New Zealand hospitals are seeing many more women with womb cancer and there has been a huge increase in the number of younger women diagnosed.
“Womb cancer particularly affects Māori and Pacific Island women – Pacific women have one of the highest rates in the world,” says Blenkiron, who is head of the University’s Department of Molecular Medicine and Pathology.
Women who are obese or have diabetes are more likely to develop cancer of the womb.
“With the epidemic of obesity and diabetes, we’re also seeing an epidemic of womb cancer,” says Blenkiron.
A decade ago, about 600 new cases of womb cancer were detected in New Zealand each year, but that has risen rapidly to about 750 a year.
It used to be regarded as a disease affecting women after menopause, but these days women as young as 30 are being diagnosed.
The national cervical screening programme was picking up 25 to 30 percent of womb cancer cases, but it has been replaced by HPV tests that don’t detect womb cancer.
“Our dream is to provide an accurate, affordable test that can be done in a GP clinic, possibly by the woman herself,” she says.
If womb cancer is picked up early, most women survive.
The Cancer Society has just granted $250,000 for their research to identify DNA mutations that cause cancer. Blenkiron and Fitzgerald hope a swab test might be developed that is sensitive enough to detect traces of DNA mutations that have been shed from the uterus into the vagina.
Since 2021, the researchers have been looking at whether the microbiome in the vagina and uterus is different in women with cancer. They have created a test using vaginal and uterine swabs that is now being trialled on about 300 women at five hospitals in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch.
