The role of human epididymal secretory protein 4 in detecting ovarian cancer

Abstract

Objective To investigate the role of human epididymal secretory protein 4 (HE4) in detecting ovarian cancer. Methods Included in this study were 120 ovarian cancer patients and 30 patients with benign ovarian tumor who were admitted to our hospital between July 2012 and January 2015. Based on the staging of ovarian cancer, patients with ovarian cancer were further divided into the early-stage ovarian cancer group (stagesⅠandⅡ) and the late-stage ovarian cancer group (stages Ⅲ and Ⅳ) . Serum levels of HE4 were measured by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) , and serum glucoside antigen 125 (CA125) by electrochemiluminescence. The positive expression rates of serum HE4 and CA125 before and after surgery were compared among groups. For subgroups of ovarian cancer patients, the changes in serum HE4 and CA125 at different time points before and after surgery were investigated. For patients in whom ovarian cancer recurred, the changes in serum HE4 and CA125 at different time points before and at the time of recurrence were also examined. Results Before surgery, the positive rates of HE4 and CA125 in the early- and late-stage ovarian cancer groups were significantly higher than those in benign ovarian tumor group (all P 0.05) . Compared with before surgery, the levels of serum HE4 and CA125 were lowered in the early- and late-stage ovarian cancer groups at different time points post-surgery (P 0.05) , but appeared significantly elevated at the time of recurrence (P<0.05) . On receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve, the area under the curve (AUC) of serum HE4 for diagnosing ovarian cancer and its recurrence was 0.927 and 0.904, respectively, which was better than the diagnostic performance of serum CA125. Conclusion HE4 offers high efficiency in diagnosing of ovarian cancer and its recurrence, and therefore is useful for monitoring the course of ovarian cancer. Key words: Human epididymis secretory protein 4; CA-125 Antigen; Ovarian Neoplasms; Recurrence; ROC curve