[Study on the clinical usefulness of NCC-ST-439 in breast cancer]

We investigated the usefulness of NCC-ST-439, a new tumor marker in breast cancer. The positive rate of NCC-ST-439 in cases of primary breast cancer was 46.9%. In cases of primary breast cancer, there were no significant differences in average and positive rate among each group of patient age, tumor size, number of metastatic node, clinical stage and status of hormone receptor (ER, PgR). The positive rate of NCC-ST-439 in early breast cancer was as high as that in advanced case. NCC-ST-439 had better sensitivity than CEA and CA15-3, and decreased in serum level after the curative operation. We concluded that NCC-ST-439 is useful as a screening marker for the detection of early breast cancer and as a post operative monitoring marker for the surveillance of the recurrence.