# Early-stage multi-cancer detection using an extracellular vesicle protein-based blood test

Source: https://onco.cc/key-papers/paper-hinestrosa-ev-protein-commun-med-2022/  
OnCo record `paper-hinestrosa-ev-protein-commun-med-2022` (Key paper). Data CC BY-NC 4.0, attribute "Data from OnCo (onco.cc)"; commercial use needs a licence.

## TL;DR

A pilot study found that proteins on tiny vesicles shed into blood could pick out early pancreatic, ovarian and bladder cancers from people without cancer.

## Summary

Hinestrosa and colleagues purified extracellular vesicles from plasma with an alternating current electrokinetics platform and built a machine-learning classifier on vesicle protein measurements. In a case-control pilot of 139 stage I and II pancreatic, ovarian or bladder cancers against 184 controls, the area under the curve was 0.95, with sensitivity 71.2% (63.2 to 78.1) at 99.5% specificity; stage I sensitivity was 70.5%, reaching 95.5% in pancreatic, 74.4% in ovarian and 43.8% in bladder cancer.

## Fields

- Kind: Key paper
- Last checked: 2026-10-29
- Journal: Communications Medicine
- Year: 2022
- DOI: 10.1038/s43856-022-00088-6
- Authors: Hinestrosa JP, Kurzrock R, Lewis JM, et al.
- Findings: Sensitivity 71.2% at 99.5% specificity for stage I and II cancers of three types.; Stage I sensitivity 70.5%.
- What it means: Proof of principle in three cancers from a small case-control set; it is not a screening result.
- Caveats: Pilot case-control study of 323 people.; Three cancer types only.

## Sources

- Communications Medicine 2022: https://doi.org/10.1038/s43856-022-00088-6
- PubMed: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35603292/

## Connected records

- cancers: [Bladder & urothelial cancer](https://onco.cc/cancers/urothelial/), [Ovarian cancer](https://onco.cc/cancers/ovarian/), [Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma](https://onco.cc/cancers/pancreatic/)
- fronts: [Early Detection & Screening](https://onco.cc/fronts/early-detection/)
- technologies: [Multi-cancer early detection (MCED)](https://onco.cc/technologies/mced/), [Proteomics & phosphoproteomics](https://onco.cc/technologies/proteomics/)

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