Serum macrophage colony-stimulating factor (M-CSF) levels in patients with epithelial ovarian cancer

The preoperative macrophage colony-stimulating factor (MCS-F) levels were measured in serum samples from 56 patients with epithelial ovarian cancer and 68 patients with benign ovarian disease who had undergone laparotomy. M-CSF values were significantly higher in the former (median, range: 2.18, 0.70-10.00 ng/ml versus 1.19, 0.17-5.54 ng/ml, P < 0.0001), and were not significantly related to stage, histology, grade of differentiation, age, and residual disease after first surgery. MCSF concentrations were also measured in 163 serum samples drawn from patients with stage III-IV epithelial ovarian cancer at different times since the first surgery. M-CSF values were higher in the 81 samples from patients with clinically evident disease than in the 82 samples from patients with no clinical evidence of disease (median, range: 2.13, 0.60-10.00 ng/ml versus 1.05, 0.40-10.00 ng/ml, P < 0.0001). M-CSF levels before second-look laparotomy were similar in the 18 patients who showed persistent disease at surgical reevaluation and in the 11 patients who achieved pathological complete response (median, range: 1.26, 0.70-3.27 ng/ml versus 0.94, 0.46-4.23 ng/ml, P = NS). M-CSF concentrations were raised (greater than or equal to 1.70 ng/ml) only in 1 (14.3%) of the 7 samples from patients with clinically evident disease and serum CA125 <5 U/ml, and only in 5 (38.5%) of the 13 samples from patients with positive second-look findings and serum CA125 <35 U/ml. In conclusion, serum M-CSF levels correlated with the clinical status of disease in patients with epithelial ovarian cancer. However, the concomitant determination of serum M-CSF seems to add little to the CA125 assay alone in the monitoring of patients with this malignancy, (C) 1998 Academic Press.