Patients

Cancer is a molecular-based disease that is often impossible to diagnose through traditional microscopic testing.

Often, physicians are plagued with incomplete information that makes it difficult to achieve a definitive diagnosis.

In traditional testing, pathologists examine a biopsy under a microscope.  Often a definitive diagnosis is achieved. However when "indeterminate, atypical, suspicious, equivocal or non-diagnostic specimen" is the result, the patient is often required to return for additional biopsies and testing.  This could mean that several months pass before a patient receives a definitive diagnosis, delaying potentially lifesaving treatment and creating anxiety in the absence of the definitive diagnoses.

Further, with certain cancer types, physicians traditionally have had difficulty making a definitive diagnosis without major surgery.

• 80% of pancreatic cancer is diagnosed late stage
• Pseudomyxoma perotonei is one of many cytology case types for which the cellular sample is inadequate for traditional pathology methods
• Up to 30% of breast cancer diagnoses are indeterminate
• 30% of colon cancers are over/under staged with dramatic ramifications for the treatment plan

If you have reached the point where a definitive diagnosis has not been possible, your physician may choose to send your biopsy to RedPath for a molecular DNA-based test called PathFinderTG.  Only your physician can order PathFinderTG.  If he or she is not familiar with RedPath's tests, please refer them to this web site, www.redpathip.com.