Determination of carbocyanine dye-binding polyanions in malignant and nonmalignant disease states

Cancer-related changes in the serum seromucoid fraction are well known. Last year Woodman published an interesting carbocyanine dye binding method for determination of serum carbohydrate polyanions in sera of normal, traumatized, and tumor-bearing mice. The usefulness of this method for clinical practice has been investigated in this study. Carbocyanine dye-binding polyanion (CPA) and the sialidase-sensitive fraction of this polyanion (SPA) have been determined in sera of 705 human subjects including healthy normal individuals and patients suffering from a broad spectrum of malignant and nonmalignant disease states. Overall, in malignant diseases the CPA and SPA values, in mg pectin equivalents per liter (mean +/-2 S.D.) (292 +/- 111 and 135 +/- 68, respectively) were significantly higher than in the serum from normal controls (166 +/- 33; 74 +/- 18) and patients hospitalized with a variety of nonmalignant disease (195 +/- 56; 92 +/- 36). The highest CPA and SPA values were found in gynecological (331 +/- 117; 149 +/- 69), bronchial (294 +/- 72; 137 +/- 51), and gastrointestinal cancers (316 +/- 111; 154 +/- 69). Elevated CPA values were found in 59.9% and elevated SPA values in 52.8% of patients suffering from malignant diseases. Successfully, radically treated cancer patients with no detectable residues or metastases for at least 1 year had values (186 +/- 39; 76 +/-24) almost within the normal ranges (93 to 250 mg pectin equivalents per liter for CPA and 35 to 120 mg pectin equivalents per liter for SPA).