A revolution for 10% of French women affected by endometriosis. The French company Ziwig has announced the imminent arrival of a saliva test, called ENDOTEST®, allowing detect endometriosis in just ten days, compared to eight to twelve years on average today. A long period of medical wandering during which affected women chain appointments, examinations and sometimes judgments before a diagnosis – and therefore a treatment – is made.
On January 11, 2022, Emmanuel Macron announced that he was setting up a national strategy to fight endometriosis, in order to “better detect the disease”. This new test is a further advance in the management of the disease. “[Il] should revolutionize the diagnosis and management of endometriosis and represent a major advance for women’s health“, promises Ziwig in a press release.
“The reliability of this test is exceptional with a sensitivity of 97%, a specificity of 100% and a diagnostic performance greater than 98%”, also commented the French Society of Gynecology this Monday, February 14.
Endotest: how does it work?
Concretely, thanks to a very simple and non-invasive use, women wishing to be tested will be able to receive a self-sampling kit at home, presented in the form of a tube in which they will have to spit. Once completed, they can return the kit to the laboratory by post and will receive a result ten days later which will confirm or invalidate the suspicion of endometriosis.
The principle of the test is to identify micro RNAs in the saliva which “sign” the presence of endometriosis.
A diagnosis still too difficult
Today, diagnostic techniques for endometriosis are cumbersome: it is done either by medical imaging (ultrasound or MRI) or by laparoscopy in the event of suspected damage to the colon. Based on a technique combining high-throughput sequencing and artificial intelligence, the ENDOTEST® will detect all types of endometriosis: superficial, deep and even those in so-called discordant patients, suffering from pain suggestive of endometriosis. but with negative medical images.
Evaluated on 200 women in several public hospitals in France, the ENDOTEST® gave reliable results in almost 100% of cases. A diagnosis so rapid that it could then make it possible to prevent certain women from becoming infertile, but also to stop the aggravation of pain and other symptoms due to endometriosis.
THE ENDOTEST® must still be validated by the French National Authority for Health before it can be marketed. Its price is set at a hundred euros, but the associations and its creators hope that it will be covered by Social Security.
Sources:
- Saliva test for the diagnosis of endometriosis: a major advance for women’s health, Ziwig press kit, February 2022.
- National College of French Gynecologists and Obstetricians, press release, February 14, 2022.
Read also:
- Endometriosis: detecting it by simply questioning patients?
- Endometriosis, soon an ALD: what would change?
