A new technique for cervical cancer has developed which can locate the cancer at early stage. Nandita de Souza and her team has developed this technique at the Institute of Cancer Research and London’s Royal Marsden Hospital. The new technique called as 'Diffusion weighted imaging'.

This technique allows the doctors to carry out precise surgery to remove the tumours. The team observed 59 women with cervical cancer aged between 24 and 83 over a period of 22 months and they found that 88% of cancer cases were detected by using the new technique as compare to 77% who were detected by using external scans.

De Souza, said, “As cervical cancers are usually identified at a very early stage through screening, our imaging technology can localise them and determine the size of the tumour. “We can use this information to plan less radical surgery, preserving as much of the uterus and the cervix as possible.”
She added, “The quality of the information from the images produced using this new method has allowed us to identify and define smaller tumours more accurately, helping us to make decisions on surgery.”

In UK, around 2,700 women are diagnosed with cancer every year and around 1,000 died in a year because the tumour is not spotted in time.

Director of cancer information at Cancer Research UK, Lasley Walker said, “This small study is extremely promising and provides a clear rationale for more extensive studies.”