Comparison of carcinoembryonic antigen prognostic value in serum and tumour tissue of patients with colorectal cancer.
OBJECTIVE
Carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA) in the serum and the tumour tissue of colorectal cancer (CRC) patients is the most commonly used tumour marker for the diagnosis and evaluation of prognosis or recurrence after treatment, but the role remains controversial. The objective of this study was to compare the prognostic value of CEA both in serum and tumour tissue in CRC.


METHODS
A total of 173 patients with CRC in stages I-III were retrospectively assessed with the endpoint of recurrence or metastasis after curative operation. CEA was assessed both in serum and tumour tissue.


RESULTS
37.0% (64/173) patients had a high level of CEA in serum (S-CEA) while 39.3% (68/173) had high CEA in tumour tissue (T-CEA). There were no significant differences in clinico-pathological features between the low and high S-CEA or T-CEA groups. The high S-CEA group had a worse prognosis than the low S-CEA group but the difference was not significant. The high T-CEA group had a significantly poorer prognosis than the low T-CEA group (P = 0.028) in the univariate analysis. The multivariate analysis demonstrated that the T-CEA was an independent prognosis factor in CRC. Because many factors would affect the concentration of S-CEA, there was no correlation between S-CEA and T-CEA directly.


CONCLUSIONS
Our study suggests that a high T-CEA concentration may be a useful and independent predictor for poor outcome after surgery in CRC patients. It may be stronger than a high preoperative serum CEA level.
Li
M
M
Gastrointestinal Surgery Unit, Peking University School of Oncology, Beijing Cancer Hospital & Institute, Beijing, PR China.
Li
J-Y
JY
Zhao
A-L
AL
He
J-S
JS
Zhou
L-X
LX
Li
Y-A
YA
Gu
J
J
D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D014408:Biomarkers, Tumor / Q000032:analysis*; D001707:Biopsy, Needle; D002272:Carcinoembryonic Antigen / Q000032:analysis / Q000097:blood*; D002681:China; D015331:Cohort Studies; D015179:Colorectal Neoplasms / Q000097:blood* / Q000401:mortality / Q000473:pathology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007150:Immunohistochemistry; D053208:Kaplan-Meier Estimate; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D015999:Multivariate Analysis; D009367:Neoplasm Staging; D011336:Probability; D011379:Prognosis; D016016:Proportional Hazards Models; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D012307:Risk Factors; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity; D012737:Sex Factors; D016019:Survival Analysis
D014408:Biomarkers, Tumor; D002272:Carcinoembryonic Antigen