CupPrint^® is a cutting edge genomic profiling service to determine the origin of the tumor in patients diagnosed with Cancer of Unknown Primary (CUP). This disease is also known as UPT (Unknown Primary Tumor) or TUO (Tumor of Unknown Origin).

What is CUP?
Although the term 'cancer' is commonly used, it actually covers a multitude of different types of malignant diseases depending on where the disease originated in the body.  When cancer cells spread to form a new tumor, it is called a secondary, or metastatic tumor (or cancer), and its cells are like those in the original tumor. This means, for example, that if breast cancer spreads (metastasizes) to the lung, the secondary tumor is made up of abnormal breast cells (not abnormal lung cells). The disease in the lung is metastatic breast cancer (not lung cancer) and asks for a very different treatment of the patient than of a lung cancer patient. That means, the primary source of the disease (e.g. breast, prostate, ovarian cancer) must be accurately identified to most effectively treat the cancer.

A metastasis is a tumor that started from a cancer cell in another part of the body. Over 10% of patients presenting to oncology units will have metastases without a clearly identifiable primary tumor. In these cases, doctors refer to the primary tumor as "unknown" and the patient is said to have cancer of unknown primary origin (CUP). Studies have shown that if simple questioning does not reveal the cancer's source (coughing up blood -'probably lung', urinating blood - 'probably bladder'), complex imaging will not either. The use of immunohistochemistry has permitted pathologists to give an identity to many of these metastases. However, the current available methods only identify the primary tumor in 20% of the CUP patients.

What is CupPrint^®?
In most cases where the true primary location of a tumor is unknown, CupPrint® can offer valuable information to assist both you and your physician in making important treatment decisions.

In cases of Cancer of Unknown Primary (CUP) or Tumor of Unknown Origin (TUO), the primary tumor is found in only 20% of the cases, even when the latest pathology and imaging techniques are used. For the majority of the CUP patients, the primary tumor remains unknown and a cancer-targeted therapy cannot be given.

CupPrint will detect the origin of the tumor in 80-90 % of cases which allows you and your physician to make more educated decision about your treatment.