Screening for ovarian cancer picked up 90 per cent of cases of the ’silent killer’ making widespread testing feasible scientists said.

Ovarian cancer is very difficult to detect early because of vague symptoms leading many experts to call it the silent killer. There are around 7,000 cases of ovarian cancer in the UK each year and about 4,500 deaths.

Scientists at University College London carried out the largest ever randomised trial of ovarian screening tests. They used blood tests to detect a protein that is produced by some ovarian tumours and ultrasound or ultrasound alone.

Findings showed that the screening programme was able to detect most women who developed ovarian cancer, 34 out of 38 using the blood test with ultrasound method, the equivalent of 90 per cent, and 24 out of 32 using ultrasound alone, or 75 per cent.

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