Quantification of circulating plasma DNA fragments as tumor markers in patients with esophageal cancer.
The quantity and quality of circulating DNA fragments was analyzed by quantitative real-time polymerase chain reactions (qPCR) in plasma from patients with esophageal carcinomas, in order to assess their diagnostic value.


METHODS
Plasma was collected preoperatively from 24 patients with esophageal cancer and 21 healthy controls. qPCR was performed using two primer sets for the beta-actin gene, amplifying short and long segments.


RESULTS
The DNA concentrations in both the short and long assays of esophageal cancer patients were significantly higher than the controls (p<0.001). The area under the receiver-operating characteristic curve was 0.83 (short) and 0.91 (long) for esophageal cancer patients versus the controls. There was also a significant difference in DNA integrity (short/long) between esophageal cancer patients and the control group (p= 0.001).


CONCLUSIONS
qPCR assays for plasma DNA concentrations and their integrity can serve as new diagnostic markers for screening and monitoring patients with esophageal cancer.
Tomita
Haruhisa
H
Division of Digestive Surgery, Department of Surgery, Kyoto Prefectural University of Medicine, Kyoto, Japan.
Ichikawa
Daisuke
D
Ikoma
Daito
D
Sai
Soujin
S
Tani
Nobuyuki
N
Ikoma
Hisashi
H
Fujiwara
Hitoshi
H
Kikuchi
Shojiro
S
Okamoto
Kazuma
K
Ochiai
Toshiya
T
Otsuji
Eigo
E
D000368:Aged; D014408:Biomarkers, Tumor / Q000097:blood* / Q000235:genetics*; D002294:Carcinoma, Squamous Cell / Q000097:blood / Q000235:genetics* / Q000473:pathology; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D004273:DNA, Neoplasm / Q000097:blood*; D004938:Esophageal Neoplasms / Q000097:blood / Q000235:genetics* / Q000473:pathology; D006801:Humans; D008875:Middle Aged; D009367:Neoplasm Staging; D016133:Polymerase Chain Reaction / Q000379:methods; D012372:ROC Curve
D014408:Biomarkers, Tumor; D004273:DNA, Neoplasm