The prognostic value of preoperative serum immunoglobulin and complement component concentrations in patients with gastric carcinoma.

Patients with and without recurrence of gastric carcinoma after potentially curative resection (stages I, II and III--pTNM) were studied. The preoperative serum concentrations of IgG and C1-INH were significantly different in a group of 22 patients with recurrence and a group of 33 survivors who were free from recurrence. The patients with recurrence had lower concentrations of IgG (8.3 +/- 2.6 g/l) and higher concentrations of C1-INH (0.4 +/- 0.07 g/l) than the recurrence-free survivors (10.8 +/- 3.5 and 0.35 +/- 0.08 g/l, respectively). The results indicate that preoperative quantitation of serum immunoglobulins and complement components may be helpful in predicting the prognosis in gastric carcinoma.