Patent ID: 7384764

Claim:
A method of prognosing a patient's response to a cancer therapy, the method comprising: a) prior to the therapy, contacting a sample of cells from the patient's tissue or organ being treated for the cancer with a solution of 5, 10, 15, 20-tetrakis (carboxyphenyl) porphine (TCPP) at about room temperature for between about 0.2-30 minutes to permit binding of the TCPP to components of abnormal precancerous or cancerous cells, if any are present, wherein the solution of TCPP comprises the TCPP predissolved in basified alcohol; b) removing unbound TCPP from the sample; c) detecting TCPP fluorescence in the sample, the presence of TCPP fluorescence being indicative that the sample contains abnormal precancerous or cancerous cells; d) at intervals during the therapy and subsequent to the therapy, performing steps a) to c) on another sample of cells from the patient's tissue or organ being treated for the cancer; and e) determining if the percentage of the abnormal pre-cancerous or cancerous cells in the samples tested during and subsequent to the therapy are reduced as compared with the sample tested prior to the therapy, the reduction being prognostic of the patient's response to the cancer therapy.