Taking part in a trial to assess a new spit test for prostate cancer saved the lives of two brothers.
Dheeresh Turnbull said that traditional methods to assess prostate cancer deemed that he had a low risk of disease.
But a new spit test, which uses a man’s genes to assess the likelihood of disease, helped the 71-year-old to discover that he actually had a life-threatening tumour in his prostate.
After finding out the news, Mr Turnbull’s brother Joel Turnbull also took part in the study and found that he, too, had an aggressive prostate tumour.
Mr Turnbull, a cognitive behavioural therapist from Brighton, joined the Barcode 1 study – which is assessing the new spit test – four years ago.
He said: “Once I agreed to go onto the trial, I underwent some tests. When my results came back, I was sent a letter to say I was in the top genetic risk category, and I was referred to the Royal Marsden.
“Further tests revealed that I had prostate cancer and I was told that a relatively low PSA score can still be harbouring a life-threatening tumour if the person falls in a certain genetic group.
“I have no family history of prostate cancer so I was completely shocked. I would never have been diagnosed at this stage if I hadn’t joined the trial.”
He went on: “Because the saliva test revealed that I had a high genetic risk of developing the disease, my younger brother, who would have been too young to join the study directly, signed up and discovered that he also had an aggressive tumour in the prostate.
“It’s incredible to think that because of this study two lives have now been saved in my family.”
Experts have said that the new test could “turn the tide on prostate cancer” after they found the test was able to identify men at highest genetic risk of disease.
And among these men, the test falsely identified fewer people with prostate cancer than the traditional PSA blood test.
It also picked up people with cancer who would have been missed by the PSA test alone and detected a higher proportion of aggressive cancers than the PSA test.
And the test also accurately identified men with prostate cancer that were missed by an MRI scan.
