Mesothelioma researchers analyzed the biomarker calretinin for efficacy as a diagnostic tool in human blood and serum, finding promising results in the data.
mesothelioma is a rare form of cancer caused almost exclusively by asbestos exposure. The cancer can develop when the fibers of asbestos become lodged in the lining of the lungs (pleural mesothelioma), heart (pericardial mesothelioma), or abdomen (peritoneal mesothelioma).
In most cases, this disease takes anywhere between 20 and 50 years to develop. In addition to experiencing difficulty breathing and swallowing, extreme weight loss is also a side effect of malignant mesothelioma cancer.
Researchers explain, “Calretinin is one of the well-established immunohistochemical markers in the diagnostics of malignant mesothelioma (MM). Its utility as a diagnostic tool in human blood, however, is scarcely investigated. The aim of this study was to develop an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) for human calretinin in blood and to assess its usefulness as a potential minimally invasive diagnostic marker for MM.”
Upon development of the enzyme-linked test, researchers studied it in samples of 97 healthy volunteers, 35 asbestos-exposed workers, and 42 malignant mesothelioma patients. Results showed median calretinin values in healthy volunteers, asbestos workers, and mesothelioma patients were 0.20, 0.33, and 0.84 ng/ml, respectively.
The median values for patients with epithelioid and biphasic mesothelioma were similar. It should be noted that no influence of age, gender, smoking status, or type of medium (plasma/serum) on calretinin values was discovered.
In conclusion, researchers noted, “On the basis of our initial results we suggest that the measurement of calretinin in human serum and plasma might be a useful marker for the diagnosis of MM, alone or combined with other markers such as soluble mesothelin. However, these results are based on relatively small numbers and further studies on more patients, including subgroups of subjects with other tumors and non-malignant lung or pleural diseases, are needed to confirm our initial data. Such a study is presently ongoing.”
Additional information about mesothelioma may be found through the mesothelioma Center.