[Antibodies against tumor associated antigens of human bronchogenic carcinoma: demonstration by anti-complement immunofluorescence (author's transl)].

A method of anti-complement immunofluorescence is described for semiquantitative measurement of antibodies in 281 sera samples obtained from patients with bronchogenic carcinoma. Tests were performed on frozen sections of 17 human bronchogenic carcinoma. - 168 sera obtained from healthy persons were used as control. Tumor and control sera were also tested on frozen sections of 10 normal lungs. - The intensity of fluorescence was measured by incident light with the aid of a Leitz microscope photometer. In comparison to control sera the mean values of fluorescence intensity of the tested 281 tumor sera were significantly higher when frozen sections of bronchogenic carcinoma were used. - In order to allow for the different content of antigens in the bronchogenic carcinoma we have calculated the rations of the tested tumor and control sera on tumor and normal sections. - The percentage of positive results showed strong dependence on the histological type of the bronchogenic carcinoma used as frozen section and differed between 16,3 and 69,1%. The highest percentage of positive reactions resulted when tumor sera were tested on frozen sections of undifferentiated bronchogenic carcinoma. Besides that sera from patients suffering from small cell bronchogenic carcinoma gave more positive results than sera from patients with other bronchogenic carcinoma. - In 78,3% of the carcinoma were tested on frozen sections of undifferentiated bronchogenic carcinoma.