Dr Jemma Longley and her team at the University of Southampton are testing whether early signs of ovarian cancer can be picked up in vaginal fluid, as part of the VIOLET study.

Women and people with gynae organs who have an altered BRCA gene are at a higher risk of breast and ovarian cancer over their lifetime. To reduce this risk they are offered surgery to remove their breasts and their ovaries. Having your ovaries removed puts you into a surgical menopause, which comes with significant side effects and long-term health effects.

A small number of women who have risk-reducing surgery to remove their ovaries have an early ovarian cancer. This is found when their ovaries and fallopian tubes are tested after surgery.

Jemma and her team will gather samples from women who are undergoing risk reducing surgery, including a blood test, vaginal swabs/diagnostic tampon, urine samples before surgery, as well as a sample of their fallopian tubes after surgery. The team will compare the samples from women with early-stage ovarian cancer to those without cancer. They will look for changes to specific markers called microRNAs in vaginal fluid and ovarian cancer cells.

The team hopes to find early markers of ovarian cancer which are also in vaginal fluid that can be used to develop a test to detect early-stage ovarian cancer. If this research is a success, the test could help women with BRCA gene alterations make informed and personalised decisions about when to have preventative surgery, or to pick up cancer early for those who are delaying or decided against surgery.