A blood test that fingerprints your tumour just won a top innovation prize

The hardest question after cancer treatment is whether any of the disease is quietly left behind. Foundation Medicine's FoundationOne MRD test — the first of its kind to combine two techniques, structural-variant tracking and digital PCR, to build a personalised fingerprint of a patient's tumour and hunt for traces of it in blood — has been named a 2026 Top Innovation winner by The Scientist in healthcare and diagnostics. After an initial test taking about two to three weeks, follow-up blood results can arrive in one to three days, helping doctors intervene earlier. The test is currently covered by Medicare for monitoring recurrence in stage II–III breast cancer.

SDG 3 · Good health and well-being — Mechanism: tech innovation