Tortora Fabiana, Guastaferro Antonella, Barbato Simona, Febbraio Ferdinando, Cimmino Amelia
Institute of Genetics and Biophysics "A. Buzzati Traverso", National Research Council (CNR), 80131 Naples, Italy.
Institute of Biochemistry and Cell Biology, National Research Council (CNR), 80131 Naples, Italy.
Sensors (Basel). 2024 Dec 10;24(24):7873. doi: 10.3390/s24247873.
Bladder cancer is one of the most common cancers worldwide. Despite its high incidence, cystoscopy remains the currently used diagnostic gold standard, although it is invasive, expensive and has low sensitivity. As a result, the cancer diagnosis is mostly late, as it occurs following the presence of hematuria in urine, and population screening is not allowed. It would therefore be desirable to be able to act promptly in the early stage of the disease with the aid of biosensing. The use of devices/tools based on genetic assessments would be of great help in this field. However, the genetic differences between populations do not allow accurate analysis in the context of population screening. Current research is directed towards the discovery of universal biomarkers present in urine with the aim of providing an approach based on a non-invasive, easy-to-perform, rapid, and accurate test that can be widely used in clinical practice for the early diagnosis and follow-up of bladder cancer. An efficient biosensing device may have a disruptive impact in terms of patient health and disease management, contributing to a decrease in mortality rate, as well as easing the social and economic burden on the national healthcare system. Considering the advantage of accessing population screening for early diagnosis of cancer, the main challenges and future perspectives are critically discussed to address the research towards the selection of suitable biomarkers for the development of a very sensitive biosensor for bladder cancer.
膀胱癌是全球最常见的癌症之一。尽管其发病率很高，但膀胱镜检查仍是目前使用的诊断金标准，尽管它具有侵入性、费用高且灵敏度低。因此，癌症诊断大多较晚，因为它是在尿液中出现血尿后才发生的，并且不允许进行人群筛查。因此，希望能够借助生物传感在疾病的早期阶段迅速采取行动。在这一领域，使用基于基因评估的设备/工具会有很大帮助。然而，人群之间的基因差异使得在人群筛查的背景下无法进行准确分析。目前的研究方向是发现尿液中存在的通用生物标志物，目的是提供一种基于非侵入性、易于操作、快速且准确的检测方法，该方法可广泛用于膀胱癌临床实践中的早期诊断和随访。一种高效的生物传感设备可能会对患者健康和疾病管理产生颠覆性影响，有助于降低死亡率，并减轻国家医疗保健系统的社会和经济负担。考虑到进行人群筛查以早期诊断癌症的优势，本文对主要挑战和未来前景进行了批判性讨论，以推动针对选择合适生物标志物以开发用于膀胱癌的高灵敏度生物传感器的研究。
