ACTREC working on app to help assess risk of breast, oral, gall bladder cancers

Mumbai, Mar 5 (PTI) The Advanced Centre for Treatment, Research and Education in Cancer (ACTREC), the research and development wing of Tata Memorial Centre, is developing a mobile application that can assess an individual's risk of developing breast, oral cavity and gall bladder cancers, offering an early screening tool aimed at improving awareness and timely detection.

The mobile application is developed by ACTERC's Centre for Cancer Epidemiology (CCE) that aims to create awareness and encourage early screening. CCE plans to launch the mobile application that assesses risks for oral cavity and gall bladder cancers in three to four months, CCE Director Dr Rajesh Dikshit told reporters.

"So, to determine your risk level - whether you are in the higher, lower, or middle risk group -you will have to test. For example for breast cancer, you have fill in details like age, postmenopausal status, BMI, breast-to-hip ratio, the number of children, and abortions, among others. Then the mobile application will calculate your risk level for developing breast cancer, which will also depend on the accuracy of the information you key in," he said.

The risk factors for oral cavity and gall bladder cancers are more or less established, so, CCE will be able to launch the mobile application that assesses risk factors for oral cavity and gall bladder cancer in another three to four months, he said.

"However, the risks for breast cancer are greater, and researchers are still compiling them. Therefore, it will take more time and CCE expects to launch it in six months," he added. PTI SM BNM