title: Carcinoembryonic antigen levels of peripheral and draining venous blood in patients with colorectal cancer. Correlation with survival.
abstract: Correlations between preoperative carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA) levels of peripheral (p-CEA) and draining blood (d-CEA), the CEA gradient between d-CEA and p-CEA (d-p CEA gradient) levels, and survival after resection of cancer lesions were examined in 94 patients with colorectal cancer. Survival rates of patients with normal p-CEA and d-CEA levels and d-p CEA gradient levels (less than 5 ng/ml) were significantly better than those of patients with abnormal levels (greater than or equal to 5 ng/ml), and the 5-year survival rates were, respectively, 62%, 69%, and 72% in the former and 42%, 41%, and 35% in the latter. The differences in the 5-year survival rates between patients with normal and abnormal d-p CEA gradient, d-CEA, and p-CEA levels were 37%, 28%, and 20%, respectively. Furthermore, the positive rates of d-CEA levels (64%) and d-p CEA gradient levels (48%) were higher than that of p-CEA levels (36%). However, some significant differences in background variables also were found between the respective groups of patients with normal and abnormal p-CEA and d-CEA levels and d-p CEA gradient levels. These results suggest that patients with poor prognoses are examined more effectively by determining their d-p CEA gradient and d-CEA levels than their p-CEA levels, and that CEA may be expressed as a quantitative sum total of various pathophysiologic variables of patients with colorectal cancer but not as an independent prognostic variable.
authors.affiliation: School of Allied Medical Sciences, Kobe University, Japan.
authors.forename: Y
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Tabuchi
authors.forename: H
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Deguchi
authors.forename: K
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Imanishi
authors.forename: Y
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Saitoh
mesh_terms: D002272:Carcinoembryonic Antigen / Q000097:blood*; D015179:Colorectal Neoplasms / Q000276:immunology* / Q000401:mortality* / Q000473:pathology / Q000601:surgery; D006801:Humans; D011863:Radioimmunoassay; D016019:Survival Analysis
chemical_list: D002272:Carcinoembryonic Antigen