title: Serum Soluble Interleukin-2 Receptor Levels in Patients with Breast Cancer.
abstract: Preoperative levels of serum soluble interleukin-2 receptor (1L-2R) were examined in 37 patients with breast cancer. We investigated the correlations of serum soluble IL-2R levels with various factors such as stage grouping, lymph node metastasis, distant metastasis, tumor size, histophthological type, estrogen receptor (ER), progesterone receptor (PgR) and CA 15-3. Serum soluble 1L-2R levels were measured with an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. Levels of serum soluble 1L-2R in the patients with stage III and IV breast cancer were significantly higher than those in the normal controls, and patients with stage I and II breast cancer. Preoperative levels of serum soluble IL-2R in patients with T3 and T4 were also significantly higher than those in patients with T1 and T2. Serum levels of IL-2R in patients with distant metastasis were also significantly higher than those in patients without distant metastasis. Moreover, serum levels of soluble IL-2R in patients with higher CA 15-3 were significantly higher than those in patients with normal CA 15-3 levels. We conclude that preoperative serum soluble IL-2R levels in patients with breast cancer may be a valuable parameter, especially in evaluating whether they have distant metastasis or not.
authors.affiliation: Second Department of Surgery, Saitama Medical School, 38 Morohongo, Moroyama-machi, Iruma-gun, Saitama 350-04, Japan.
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Murakami
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Hirayama
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Satomi
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Okubo
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Matsuki
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Sakata
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Tsuji