‘Our Future Health is globally unique. It can show us the risks and signs of cancer’
If you ever wanted to show how health research helps cancer healthcare, just look at the example of smoking.
Before the 1950s, we didn’t know for sure that smoking causes cancer. Then, one crucial research study changed everything. In 1951, the British Doctors Study started to follow the health of 41,000 doctors. Even by 1954, it was clear that the more someone smoked, the more likely they were to get cancer.
“Some of the biggest insights into cancer have come from research that used large numbers of people – just like Our Future Health” says David Crosby, Head of Prevention and Early Detection Research at Cancer Research UK (CRUK). “These are often called ‘population studies’.
“The British Doctors Study in the 1950s proved the link between smoking and cancer by looking at tens of thousands of people. So, what can Our Future Health prove, by collecting data from up to five million?”
Detecting cancer earlier than ever before
David is well placed to consider the question. CRUK has one of the biggest medical research budgets in the world, funding almost half of all non-commercial cancer research in the UK. David’s job is to take a long-term view of all the potential studies in his area, and ensure that CRUK supports the best quality research with the highest likelihood of translation to health benefit. Earlier this year, the charity announced that it is now helping to co-fund Our Future Health.
“Our aim is to get to a world where we have early detection of every cancer,” says David. “Many of us have personal experiences of loved ones or friends who have received a late diagnosis, when cancer is untreatable. Early detection makes a dramatic difference in survival.”
For example, someone who is diagnosed with stage one bowel cancer has a 90% chance of survival. That drops to just 10% for bowel cancer that’s discovered at stage four.
This is where Our Future Health comes in, offering the research community an incredibly detailed picture of the UK’s health. “With a large number of people in a study, scientists are better able to look for signals that allow them to detect cancer early,” David says.
“It’s also a big positive that Our Future Health will follow its volunteers for a long period of time.” He cites a previous study on ovarian cancer, carried out by CRUK, the Medical Research Council, and The Eve Appeal charity, in which, unusually, women were asked to give blood at yearly intervals prior to any cancer diagnosis. “When one of the women developed cancer, scientists could then look back at their previous blood samples to look for the early clues that exist before any symptoms.”
“Our Future Health will work on the same principle – only at a much bigger scale. We’ll have all this long-term health data from across the population. In the years to come, I hope scientists will be able to look back and to see the point at which the signal of cancer emerges, before symptoms and diagnosis, and then use this information to develop tests to look for hidden cancers in others.”
Of course, searching for cancer signals is complex – a needle in a haystack. For example, when analysing blood samples, it can require scientists to look at the levels of hundreds of thousands of molecules. Again, the scale of Our Future Health is a benefit here. “When you’re measuring so many molecules, you need to do so across a lot of people,” says David. “Only then can you be certain whether the signal you’re seeing is real or not.”
Can we prevent cancer before it begins?
Bigger is also better when it comes to preventing cancer, says David. When scientists test how well a cancer preventive intervention (e.g. a drug or vaccine) works, they need a lot of people to take part in a long-term study. Approved researchers will be able to use Our Future Health to identify volunteers of interest and invite them to take part in follow-up studies.
The unprecedented scale of Our Future Health will also be useful for calculating someone’s risk of specific cancers. “Your genes are very important,” says David, “but so is your lifestyle. Things like whether you smoke, drink alcohol, what you eat, how much you exercise, your sleep patterns, whether you live in a more or less polluted area, and your socio-economic status; all of these factors affect your risk of developing cancer.”
“Long-term research like Our Future Health can give us a clear picture of risk factors. In the future, we will be able to look back at all the people who got cancer and pick out what it was that led to them being at increased risk. Once we understand who’s at higher risk, then we can try to reduce their risk. That could mean more precise screening services.”
Here, Our Future Health’s commitment to building a diverse group of volunteers is key, says David. It means researchers can draw conclusions that work for specific communities, rather than adopting a one-size-fits-all approach to cancer prevention.
“The intended scale and diversity of Our Future Health make it globally unique,” says David. “The volume of data that are going to be generated is going to provide an incredible opportunity for discovery and insight by cancer researchers.” Watch this space: this is going to be an exciting partnership.
Let’s prevent disease together
By volunteering for Our Future Health, you can help health researchers discover new ways to prevent, detect and treat common conditions such as diabetes, cancer, heart disease, stroke and Alzheimer’s.