PROVIDENCE – A researcher at Women & Infants Hospital of Rhode Island has found a new way to predict whether an ovarian mass is cancerous, by testing for two proteins in the bloodstream, an improvement over existing tests that the hospital says could sharply improve diagnostics.

Dr. Richard Moore, who is also director of the Medical Education Program in Women’s Oncology at The Warren Alpert Medical School at Brown University, unveiled his research Monday at a meeting of the Society of Gynecologic Oncologists in Tampa.

A test for one protein, CA125II, has been considered the “gold standard” for monitoring ovarian cancer in recent years, but Moore sought to maximize the sensitivity and specificity of the test by combining it with tests for other known tumor markers.

Moore found that the ideal protein to test for was HE4, which appears at elevated levels in women with epithelial ovarian cancer. By testing for HE4 and CA125II together, Moore said, doctors can detect ovarian cancer with much greater precision.

Moore evaluated the combined test in a pilot study with 496 women with pelvic masses or ovarian cysts at 12 sites across the country, all of whom also had biopsies of the masses. In an article in last month’s issue of the journal Gynecologic Oncology, he reported that 95 percent of those identified as “high risk” were, indeed, found to have cancer.

“Roughly 20 percent of women will be diagnosed with an ovarian cyst or tumor at some point in her life,” Moore said in the article. “Only a small percentage of these women will be diagnosed with ovarian cancer.

“This powerful combination offers hope for a more effective way to manage and treat ovarian cancer, as well as a possible screening tool for women in the earliest stages of the disease when it is most treatable.”

Moore noted that women with ovarian cancer do substantially better when treated by specialized surgeons at specialized institutions, so identifying those patients early and accurately can make a big difference for them – and spare others unnecessary procedures.

“This enables us to predict which pelvic masses are cancerous and facilitate referral of those patients to the specialists,” he said. “Patients with benign tumors can be treated by their own gynecologists.”

Moore worked with Fujirebio Diagnostics, which developed the CA125 test, to develop the HE4 blood test. Fujirebio announced last week that the new test is now available in Europe. The HE4 test is awaiting clearance by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. The company anticipates the test will be available here in 2008.

“Together, CA125 and HE4 offer a powerful combination that could dramatically change the way ovarian cancer is managed at all stages of care,” said Dr. Olle Nilsson, vice president and chief scientific officer of Fujirebio Diagnostics, in a news release.

Women & Infants Hospital of Rhode Island, a Care New England hospital, specializes in the care of women and newborns and is the primary teaching affiliate of The Warren Alpert Medical School at Brown University for obstetrics, gynecology and newborn pediatrics. For information about Women & Infants, log on to www.womenandinfants.org.