1. ¹Department of Physiology, Institute of Biomedicine, University of Turku, FI-20520 Turku, Finland
2. ²Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Turku University Hospital, FI-20520 Turku, Finland
3. ³Department of Mathematics, University of Turku, FI-20014 Turku, Finland
4. ⁴Department of Pathology, Turku University Hospital, FI-20520 Turku, Finland
5. ⁵Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Päijät-Häme Central Hospital, FI-15850 Lahti, Finland
6. ⁶Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Helsinki University Hospital, FI-00029 Helsinki, Finland
7. ⁷Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, North Karelia Central Hospital, FI-80210 Joensuu, Finland
8. ⁸Turku Center for Disease Modeling, University of Turku, FI-20520 Turku, Finland

Correspondence: Dr A Perheentupa, E-mail: antti.perheentupa@utu.fi

Received 27 January 2009; Revised 2 March 2009; Accepted 5 March 2009; Published online 31 March 2009.

Abstract

Human epididymal secretory protein E4 (HE4, also known as WAP four-disulphide core domain protein 2) is a new promising biomarker for ovarian cancer but its specificity against ovarian endometriotic cysts is only superficially known. We, thus, analysed serum HE4 concentrations together with a tumour marker CA125 in serum samples of women diagnosed with various types of endometriosis, endometrial cancer or ovarian cancer, and in samples from healthy controls. The mean serum concentration of HE4 was significantly higher in serum samples of patients with both endometrial (99.2 pM, P<0.001) and ovarian (1125.4 pM, P<0.001) cancer but not with ovarian endometriomas (46.0 pM) or other types of endometriosis (45.5 pM) as compared with healthy controls (40.5 pM). The serum CA125 concentrations were elevated in patients with ovarian cancer, advanced endometriosis with peritoneal or deep lesions, or ovarian endometriomas, but not in the patients with endometrial cancer. The microarray results revealed that the mRNA expression of the genes encoding HE4 and CA125 reflected the serum protein concentrations. Taken together, measuring both HE4 and CA125 serum concentrations increases the accuracy of ovarian cancer diagnosis and provides valuable information to discriminate ovarian tumours from ovarian endometriotic cysts.