The test searches for tumour DNA in the bloodstream (Image: Getty)
A promising blood test that checks for signs of more than 50 with a single sample could be rolled out on the next year, according to one of the experts behind it.
The NHS is running a major trial of the Galleri test with more than 140,000 volunteers across 150 locations.
Developed by Californian company Grail, it searchers for tiny fragments of DNA shed into the bloodstream by tumour cells.
Results from the NHS are expected next year. Sir Harpal Kumar, the president of Grail, said he hoped it could be used in the NHS immediately if successful, The Telegraph reported.
Sir Harpal told a panel event: “We’re hopeful the results will be positive and then I think it is a case of how quickly we can [start] to implement it.
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“We can’t do what we’ve done in the past, which is we get results from great trials and then it takes 10 years before we get to a decision to roll anything out.”
The NHS announced last year that it was waiting to see final results from trials in 2026 before deciding whether Galleri should be rolled out.
It said preliminary data from the first year of the study was “very promising” but not compelling enough to justify the immediate launch of a large-scale pilot programme, which would have required “exceptional data”.
Sir Harpal Kumar, who previously served as chief executive of Cancer Research UK for seven years, added that the NHS should not let “perfection be the enemy of good”.
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And he called for action to “address the really big problems in the country by using these kinds of technologies as quickly as we possibly can”.
Multi-cancer screening tests could be more economical than using many different screening programmes for different forms of the disease.
Sir Harpal added: “I do think we’re going to have to have multi-cancer screening tests. The good news is the technology is there.
“It’s evolving and it’s continuing to improve and it turns out that some of those are better at picking up cancers that we have never been able to pick up before.”
Speaking at the same event, Prof Peter Johnson, the NHS national cancer director, said the technology was promising and might “offer us some solutions” to boost early diagnosis.