Carcinoembryonic antigen in patients with gynecologic malignancies.

The determination of carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA) in plasma has been of much interest currently concomitant with the search for an immunologic diagnosis test. Recent reports have shed some doubt on the specificity of carcinoembryonic antigens for gastrointestinal tract malignancies. This report details the plasma CEA values in 341 patients with varying gynecologic malignancies. These studies have demonstrated that plasma CEA is elevated in close to 50 per cent of patients with invasive gynecologic cancer. The incidence of positive values is appreciably higher in the advanced stages of disease. Of particular interest was that 84 per cent (21 of 25) of the patients with recurrent squamous-cell carcinoma of the cervix had a positive CEA value. Similar results were found in patients with cancer of the vulva, ovary, and endometrium.