Intensive post-operative follow-up of breast cancer patients with tumour markers: CEA TPA or CA15.3 vs MCA and MCA-CA15.3 vs CEA-TPA-CA15.3 panel in the early detection of distant metastases

摘要

BackgroundIn breast cancer current guidelines do not recommend the routine use of serum tumour markers. Differently, we observed that CEA-TPA-CA15.3 (carcinoembryonic (CEA) tissue polypeptide (TPA) and cancer associated 115D8/DF3 (CA15.3) antigens) panel permits early detection and treatment for most relapsing patients. As high sensitivity and specificity and different cut-off values have been reported for mucin-like carcinoma associated antigen (MCA), we compared MCA with the above mentioned tumour markers and MCA-CA15.3 with the CEA-TPA-CA15.3 panel.