Can IL-2R alpha be a valuable marker along with CA 19-9 in the diagnosis of chronic pancreatitis and pancreatic cancer?

Abstract

Pancreatic cancer is characterized initially by non-specific abdominal symptoms followed by rapid tumor progression. Although chronic pancreatitis is a benign disorder, it can be one of the causative factors of pancreatic cancer. The level of the tumor marker carbohydrate antigen 19-9 (CA 19-9) in pancreatic cancer does not correlate with the stage of the neoplasm. Soluble interleukin 2 receptor (sIL-2R) is a cytokine that shows increased levels during some inflammatory processes and malignant disorders. Our aim in this study was to investigate whether sIL-2Ralpha levels can be used in association with CA 19-9 in the early diagnosis of pancreatic cancer and chronic pancreatitis. Serum samples were obtained from the blood of 21 pancreatic cancer patients without distant metastasis who were deemed inoperable, 16 chronic pancreatitis patients and 20 normal volunteers. We did not find any significant differences in CA 19-9 levels between normal controls and patients with chronic pancreatitis. There was a significant difference in the levels between the control group and the pancreatic cancer group (p = 0.003) and between patients with chronic pancreatitis and those with pancreatic cancer (p = 0.004). Although there was no significant difference in sIL-2Ralpha levels between the control group and the patient groups, we found a slight correlation between sIL-2Ralpha and CA 19-9 levels in the pancreatic cancer group (p = 0.003, r = 0.623) and a more marked correlation in the chronic pancreatitis group (p < 0.01, r = 0.751). According to our results, sIL-2Ralpha alone is not a good candidate marker in the diagnosis of pancreatic cancer; it can, however, be used in association with CA 19-9 for this purpose.