The investigation of carcinoembrıogenic carcinom antigen, lipid-associated sialic acid, TNF-ALPHA as tumor markers in head and neck carcinoma

ABSTRACTHead and neck cancers is the only cancer type, which the 5-year survival rate has notimproved during the last two decades. It is necessary to define alternative methods in earlydiagnosis, treatment and detecting prognosis. The tumor markers using in the other cancertypes is also an alteration for head and neck cancers.In this study; LSA, CEA and TNF-alpha were investigated as tumor markers in 40 headand neck cancer patients, treated by surgically, radiotherapy and surgically with adjuvantradiotherapy. The control group was obtained from 20 patients that have benign andinflamatuar pathologies.Blood sampling was performed three times before the treatment, 1 month and 3 monthafter the surgery or radiotherapy from the study group. The pretreatment concentrations of allthree tumor markers in the study group was compared with the serum levels of control group.Also the tumor differantiation, the nodal neck metastasis, the tumor size and the anatomicallocalisations were examined in study group.In the result, the pretreatment serum levels of LSA was significantly higher than thecontrol group. It was measured that the posttreatment levels of LSA were decreasing.However, it was not significantly. Also the LSA levels were higher in T3-T4 tumors whencompared with T1-T2 tumors. But it was not significantly either. There was no significentdifferences in the other potential tumor markers.In the light of these findings, LSA should be a potential tumor in neck and neck cancersneeding further investigations.