The performance of CA-125 measurement in the detection of endometriosis: a meta-analysis

Systematic review / meta-analysis OA: closed CC0 ⤵ 266 in-corpus citations
View on OpenAlex View on PubMed View at publisher
⚙ AI-generated summary by gemini-2.5-flash-lite, 2026-06-08 ⓘ

This meta-analysis evaluated the diagnostic performance of CA-125 for detecting endometriosis.

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

Abstract

OBJECTIVE: To assess the diagnostic performance of serum CA-125 measurement in the detection of endometriosis. DESIGN: Meta-analysis. SETTING AND PATIENT(S): Twenty-three studies comparing serum CA-125 levels and laparoscopically confirmed endometriosis. INTERVENTION(S): Serum CA-125 measurement and laparoscopy. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE(S): Sensitivity and specificity of serum CA-125 measurement in the diagnosis of endometriosis with laparoscopy as the reference standard. RESULT(S): The estimated summary receiver operating characteristic curves showed that the performance of serum CA-125 measurement in the diagnosis of endometriosis grade I/IV is limited, whereas its performance in the diagnosis of endometriosis grade III/IV is better. CONCLUSION(S): Despite its limited diagnostic performance, we believe that the routine use of serum CA-125 measurement in patients with infertility might be justified. In contrast to laparoscopy, serum CA-125 measurement is an inexpensive test that is not a burden for the patient. It could identify a subgroup of patients who are more likely to benefit from early laparoscopy. Studies reporting on the mutual dependence between serum CA-125 measurement and data from the history and physical examination are needed.

My notes (saved in your browser only)

Condition tags

endometriosis

MeSH descriptors

CA-125 Antigen Endometriosis CA-125 Antigen CA-125 Antigen Endometriosis Endometriosis Endometriosis Endometriosis Female Female Humans Humans Laparoscopy Laparoscopy Predictive Value of Tests Predictive Value of Tests Reference Standards Reference Standards ROC Curve ROC Curve

Citation neighborhood (2-hop)

Papers in the corpus that this work cites (lower rings, blue) and that cite this one (upper rings, green). Dot size scales with the paper's in-corpus citation count — bigger dot = more influential within the endo/adeno field. Click a dot to open that paper. Outer rings show 2-hop neighbours — papers reached through the immediate citers/citees. [ collapse to 1-hop ]

References (55)

Cited by (50)

Source provenance

europepmc
last seen: 2026-10-12T06:17:10.165071+00:00
openalex
last seen: 2026-06-10T17:14:06.276822+00:00
pubmed
last seen: 2026-10-08T22:00:48.437354+00:00
License: CC0 · commercial use OK