NHS hospitals to pilot AI blood test for womb cancer screening

Developed by the Leeds-based firm PinPoint Data Science, the test analyzes approximately 30 blood markers to classify patients into low, elevated, or high-risk categories. During a trial involving 16,481 patients in Yorkshire, the tool demonstrated a 99.1% success rate in identifying cancers as elevated or high risk, while providing a 99.8% negative predictive value for those in the lowest-risk group. The test, which costs roughly £30, aims to streamline the referral pathway for the 90,000 postmenopausal women who visit GPs with heavy bleeding annually.

Currently, diagnostic protocols rely on pelvic examinations and transvaginal ultrasound scans, procedures often described by patients as painful or distressing. By introducing this triage step, clinicians at Mid Yorkshire NHS Teaching Trust and Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust hope to prioritize high-risk cases while ruling out low-risk patients earlier in the process. Dr. Jacinta Walsh, a GP in Normanton, noted that the current pathway can require up to six visits before cancer is excluded, a cycle the test could significantly shorten. While Cancer Research UK has labeled the technology as promising, the charity emphasizes that further research remains necessary to confirm long-term clinical outcomes and the impact on broader NHS diagnostic capacity.