Exploratory Analysis of CA125-MGL and –STn Glycoforms in the Differential Diagnostics of Pelvic Masses

Liina Salminen, Nimrah Nadeem, Anne Lone Denny Rolfsen, Anne Lone Rolfsen, Anne Dørum, Teemu D Laajala, Seija Grènman, Seija Grénman, Sakari Hietanen, Taija Heinosalo, Antti Perheentupa, Matti Poutanen, Nils Bolstad, Olli Carpén, Urpo Lamminmäki, Kim Pettersson, Kamlesh Gidwani, Johanna Hynninen, Kaisa Huhtinen
The journal of applied laboratory medicine · 2020 · vol. 5(2) , pp. 263–272 · doi:10.1093/jalm/jfz012 · PMID:32445385 · W3007948193
article OA: bronze CC0
📄 Open PDF View on OpenAlex View on PubMed View at publisher
⚙ AI-generated summary by claude@2026-06, 2026-06-10 ⓘ

CA125-MGL and CA125-STn glycoform assays improve the differential diagnosis of pelvic masses, particularly in postmenopausal patients with marginally elevated conventional CA125 levels, by increasing sensitivity and reducing false positives.

One-sentence paraphrase of the abstract; not a substitute for reading it. No clinical advice. How this works

Abstract

BACKGROUND: The cancer antigen 125 (CA125) immunoassay (IA) does not distinguish epithelial ovarian cancer (EOC) from benign disease with the sensitivity needed in clinical practice. In recent studies, glycoforms of CA125 have shown potential as biomarkers in EOC. Here, we assessed the diagnostic abilities of two recently developed CA125 glycoform assays for patients with a pelvic mass. Detailed analysis was further conducted for postmenopausal patients with marginally elevated conventionally measured CA125 levels, as this subgroup presents a diagnostic challenge in the clinical setting. METHODS: Our study population contained 549 patients diagnosed with EOC, benign ovarian tumors, and endometriosis. Of these, 288 patients were postmenopausal, and 98 of them presented with marginally elevated serum levels of conventionally measured CA125 at diagnosis. Preoperative serum levels of conventionally measured CA125 and its glycoforms (CA125-MGL and CA125-STn) were determined. RESULTS: The CA125-STn assay identified EOC significantly better than the conventional CA125-IA in postmenopausal patients (85% vs. 74% sensitivity at a fixed specificity of 90%, P = 0.0009). Further, both glycoform assays had superior AUCs compared to the conventional CA125-IA in postmenopausal patients with marginally elevated CA125. Importantly, the glycoform assays reduced the false positive rate of the conventional CA125-IA. CONCLUSIONS: The results indicate that the CA125 glycoform assays markedly improve the performance of the conventional CA125-IA in the differential diagnosis of pelvic masses. This result is especially valuable when CA125 is marginally elevated.

My notes (saved in your browser only)

Condition tags

endometriosis

MeSH descriptors

Antigens, Tumor-Associated, Carbohydrate Biomarkers, Tumor CA-125 Antigen Lectins, C-Type Membrane Proteins Pelvic Neoplasms Pelvic Neoplasms Adult Aged Antigens, Tumor-Associated, Carbohydrate Area Under Curve CA-125 Antigen Carcinoma, Ovarian Epithelial Carcinoma, Ovarian Epithelial Carcinoma, Ovarian Epithelial Diagnosis, Differential Female Humans Immunoassay Lectins, C-Type

Citation neighborhood (sparse)

Too few in-corpus citations on either side for a chart; here are the lists.

Cites (1)

References (31)

Source provenance

europepmc
last seen: 2026-06-12T06:13:51.797165+00:00
openalex
last seen: 2026-06-04T00:00:01.174412+00:00
pubmed
last seen: 2026-05-13T22:21:59.141895+00:00
License: CC0 · commercial use OK