DISCRIMINANT FUNCTION BASED ON STEROID ABNORMALITIES IN PATIENTS WITH LUNG CANCER

The urinary excretion of androsterone. ætiocholanolone, dehydroepiandrosterone, total 17-oxosteroids, and total 17-hydroxy-corticosteroids (17-OHc.s.) was measured in two or three consecutive early-morning specimens of urine from one hundred and forty-two lung-cancer patients, fifty-two inpatient controls, and a hundred healthy controls. Patients with lung cancer have low androsterone/ætiocholanolone ratios and high 17-OHc.s./ androsterone ratios compared with controls. When the steroid values are combined in a discriminant function the error of misclassification is less than 10%. The low androsterone/ætiocholanolone ratio does not change after the surgical removal of the tumour. The discriminant function is lower in patients with inoperable tumours than in patients with operable tumours and may, therefore, be of diagnostic or prognostic value.