The Monitoring of Neopterin in Comparison with Tumor Markers in Colorectal Carcinoma

Miloslav Hronek¹ (hronek@faf.cuni.cz), Zdeněk Zadák², Dagmar Solichová², Pavel Jandík³, Bohuslav Melichar³

¹Department of Biological and Medical Sciences, Charles University in Prague, Faculty of Pharmacy in Hradec Králové
²Department of Metabolic Care and Gerontology, Charles University in Prague, Teaching Hospital in Hradec Králové
³Surgery Department, Charles University in Prague, Teaching Hospital in Hradec Králové, Czech Republic

Summary

The results of a study conducted to determine the usefulness of neopterin in comparison with tumor markers (CEA, CA 72-4, AFP, TPA) monitoring in the follow up of patients are reported here. The subject of this study were thirty patients (aged 64 ± 12 years) with colorectal cancer at the time of diagnosis in comparison with thirty control persons (aged 61 ± 11 years) with benign disorders not associated with a systemic inflammatory response. The results revealed significantly increased levels of neopterin in urine and tumor markers in plasma compared to reference group. It has been found correlation between excretion of neopterin and single tumor markers in general evaluation but levels of tumor markers have not been dependent on the staging of colorectal cancer. Thus, we conclude that urine neopterin monitoring can be useful for detection of activity immune responses and depend on staging of colorectal cancer different from tumor markers.