Oxidant, vitamin A and angiogenic markers in laryngeal cancer patients

In this study the status of oxidant stress, vitamin A and angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE) levels were evaluated in cases of laryngeal carcinoma patients from Northern India. In control subjects the levels of malondialdehyde (MDA), vitamin A and ACE were 0.23 +/- 0.07 nmole/ml, 2515 +/- 84 IU, and 1.4 +/- 0.8 U/ml respectively. Thirty laryngeal cancer patients were divided into three groups according to the TNM classification (American Joint Committee on Cancers). In laryngeal cancer patients according to tumour size, MDA and ACE levels increased to 0.32 +/- 0.04 nmole/ml and 4.7 +/- 0.5 U/ml respectively and the effect was statistically significant (p<0.01). The correlation coefficient between different subgroups was also highly significant (r=0.96, p<0.01). However, serum vitamin A levels decreased to 621 +/- 20 IU and the effect was statistically significant (p<0.01). In another two groups of laryngeal cancer patients, a similar pattern of various markers was obtained. Thirty patients with laryngeal carcinoma were divided into four different groups according to nodal involvement and it was observed that in laryngeal cancer patients with no nodal involvement, ACE levels were low 3.6 +/- 1.4 U/ml while patients with maximum nodal involvement had the highest levels of ACE 7.1 +/- 0.18 U/ml. The correlation coefficient between different groups is highly statistically significant (r=0.95, p<0.01). In patients with laryngeal cancer the serum MDA and vitamin A levels correlation coefficient between different groups was not significant. It is thus concluded that serum ACE might be a specific test marker for laryngeal cancer disease burden. The use of this marker enzyme for therapeutics is being planned.