Head and neck cancer and p53-immunogenicity.
BACKGROUND
p53-mutations are of major importance in the development of human malignancies and occur frequently in head and neck cancer. The detection of serum p53-antibodies has been performed for a number of different cancers. For head and neck cancer though, the occurrence of serum p53-antibodies has not been determined so far.


METHODS
A set of 82 sera from patients with squamous cell carcinomas of the head and neck were screened for circulating antibodies against p53 with ELISA.


RESULTS
Of 82 patients 22% (n = 18) demonstrated p53-antibodies in their sera; the specificity for malignancy was 100%.


CONCLUSIONS
As far as we know, this is the first study to reveal p53-antibodies in the sera of patients with SCCHN. The high incidence of positivity for p53-antibodies in this subset of cancer patients may give additional help in the diagnosis of this often disfiguring disease.
Maass
J D
JD
Department of Otorhinolaryngology, Head and Neck Surgery, University of Kiel, Germany.
Gottschlich
S
S
Goeroegh
T
T
Lippert
B M
BM
Werner
J A
JA
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000906:Antibodies / Q000097:blood*; D002294:Carcinoma, Squamous Cell / Q000097:blood*; D006258:Head and Neck Neoplasms / Q000097:blood*; D006801:Humans; D008875:Middle Aged; D016159:Tumor Suppressor Protein p53 / Q000276:immunology*
D000906:Antibodies; D016159:Tumor Suppressor Protein p53