FRIDAY, Nov. 14, 2025 (HealthDay News) — Pancreatic cancer is known as a silent killer, showing few symptoms until it reaches its final, lethal stages.
But researchers believe they have found a warning sign that could help detect pancreatic cancers at an earlier, more treatable stage.
Enlargement of the pancreatic duct, which connects the organ to the bile duct, is linked to increased odds of pancreatic cancer among people at high risk for the disease, researchers reported in the journal Gastro Hep Advances.
“This finding could lead to better survival if cancers are caught early,” lead researcher Dr. Marcia Irene Canto said in a news release. She is a professor of medicine and oncology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore.
The pancreas is an organ located behind the stomach, according to the American Cancer Society (ACS). It plays a crucial role in digestion and blood sugar regulation, producing digestive enzymes and hormones such as insulin.
Pancreatic cancer accounts for about 3 percent of all cancers in the U.S., but 8 percent of all cancer deaths, according to the ACS.
This is because it is often diagnosed at a late stage, after it has begun to spread to other organs, with five-year survival rates ranging from 3% to 16%, the ACS says. The pancreas is deep in the body, so doctors can’t detect early tumors during routine physical exams.
For the new study, researchers performed MRIs and ultrasounds on 641 people at high risk for pancreatic cancer, either because several immediate blood relatives have had it or because their genetics increase their risk.
The team found enlarged pancreatic duct in 97 of the patients.
People with this enlargement were 16 percent more likely to develop pancreatic cancer after five years, and 26 percent more likely after 10 years, according to the study.
Overall, participants were 2.6 times more likely to end up with pancreatic cancer if they had an enlarged duct, especially if they also had three or more pancreatic cysts, the researchers found.
“By identifying this risk factor early, we were able to intervene more quickly,” Canto said.
“The intervention would be to operate or do much more frequent imaging,” he continued. “It was remarkable how, even with the best imaging technology, a mass of pancreatic cancer may not be visible even when it is causing structural changes in the gland. We have the opportunity to do better.”
This warning sign may be found as doctors perform scans for other health problems such as kidney stones or abdominal pain, Canto noted.
“Providers need to be aware that this is something that needs to be addressed immediately,” he said.
The next step in the research is to train AI to analyze scans of the pancreas to make a more specific and accurate prediction of cancer risk, Canto said.
More information
The American Cancer Society has more information about pancreatic cancer.
SOURCES: Gastro Hep Advances, September 12, 2025; Johns Hopkins Medicine, news release, November 11, 2025
