Indrasena Buddhike Sri Harsha
Buddhike Sri Harsha Indrasena, Consultant General and Endocrine Surgeon, Kandy General Hospital (Teaching), Kandy 20000, Sri Lanka.
World J Biol Chem. 2017 Feb 26;8(1):81-85. doi: 10.4331/wjbc.v8.i1.81.
It is worthwhile to measure serum thyroglobulin (TG) level in thyroid cancer before subjecting patients to surgery for two reasons. Firstly, if the level is high, it may give a clue to the local and metastatic tumour burden at presentation; secondly, if the level is normal, it identifies the patients who are unlikely to show rising TG levels in the presence of thyroid cancer. Those who have high serum TG before surgery will show up recurrence as rising serum TG during the postoperative period. Those who do not have high serum TG before surgery will not show up rising serum TG in the presence of recurrent disease. In the latter situation, normal TG level gives only a false reassurance regarding recurrence of disease. Nevertheless, rising serum TG during the postoperative period must be interpreted cautiously because this could be due to the enlargement of non-cancerous residual thyroid tissue inadvertently left behind during surgery.
在甲状腺癌患者接受手术前检测血清甲状腺球蛋白（TG）水平是值得的，原因有两个。首先，如果该水平较高，可能提示就诊时局部和转移瘤负荷情况；其次，如果该水平正常，则可识别出在患甲状腺癌时不太可能出现TG水平升高的患者。术前血清TG水平高的患者，术后血清TG升高将提示复发。术前血清TG水平不高的患者，即使疾病复发，血清TG也不会升高。在后一种情况下，正常的TG水平对于疾病复发仅提供了一种虚假的安心。然而，术后血清TG升高必须谨慎解读，因为这可能是由于手术中无意中残留的非癌性甲状腺组织增大所致。
