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Molecular residual disease (MRD) testing, anyone had it?
I went for my usual treatments for my stage 4 breast cancer yesterday, just a zometa infusion and a lupron injection. It didn't look like anything abnormal or I should say, nothing differently abnormal on my blood work.
Then I get a call early this morning from a lab called Natera, saying my oncologist ordered some specialty lab testing and that they want to come to my house in a few days and draw blood every 3 months after that to perform this testing. They mentioned a few different ones something about tumor markers, DPYD genotyping test and something called molecular residual disease (MRD) testing, which would be the repeat one I think. Has anyone had this before or are currently being monitored with this testing? I had never heard of it until today. I am just curious if it's something used pretty regularly or not? It's made me curious as to why they suddenly would order this after 3-1/2 years of the same run of the mill tests and treatment.
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Yes, I had tongue and lymph node cancer in 2023. I've had Natera testing since then. They have my tumor DNA and search my blood for it every 2 months. Should my cancer return....the Natera test should show it first. That's the idea.
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4 ReactionsI have been doing the Natera for 2 1/2 years. My doctor set me up to have it drawn every 3 months it’s supposed to see if there’s any cells in my blood from my original diagnosis. They use your cancer to make a profile and then test you against it. My test for 6 different draws were all zero then in January 2025 it came back positive. I had a reoccurrence. I’m going to ask them about the other thing you mentioned because I don’t know if that’s two separate tests with Natera or if that’s just another name, your doctor used. I would be glad to speak to you. You could call me and I can tell you what happened with me over the years with this process. I never use them coming to my house though I was always worried they may not know how to draw well and if you have an issue, you’re at home and I’d rather be in a facility to have my blood drawn lol
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4 ReactionsI've had it done for 2 years from a squamous cell tumor that went to a lymph node. Libtayo Immunotherapy and Natera test. My Natera was elevated 3 months ago and now is down to 0 so hoping it stays that way.
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2 ReactionsThank you all for sharing your experiences with this testing. I am glad to hear it's not something brand new, I am always a little leery of anything new, be it testing or treatments. It sounds useful if it can detect when treatment is starting to fail. I am not a huge fan of getting CT scans every 3-4 months, which has been going on since my diagnoses and they have finally pushed those back to every 6 months now. Sounds like this testing will be a better inbetween way of keeping tabs on resurgence.
@mawmaws I went on the Natera portal and it looks like they have 3 separate tests ordered for this first draw. DPYD Genotyping, Altera and Signatera are the names. I tried googling the DPYD Genotyping and it seems like that one has something to do with predicting potential bad reactions to a certain class of drugs used in chemotherapy. Not sure why my doctor ordered that one unless it's just some new policy.
@coco46, there are many discussions in different cancer support groups about moledcular residual tesing. Here is one example in the Breast Cancer support group:
- Signatera Test. Is it truly helpful and worthwhile? https://connect.mayoclinic.org/discussion/signatera-test-is-it-truly-helpful-and-worthwhile/
Using the search function, you can see all. There are more search results using the search term Signatera:
- https://connect.mayoclinic.org/search/discussions/ (28 discussions)
I'd be interested to know why your onocologist ordered the testing for you. You're asking the right questions. 🙂