What does high carbohydrate antigen mean?

In life, many people will understand their physical condition by testing carbohydrate antigens. This test method can detect cancer or precancerous lesions early. Although there are many methods for tumor detection, only blood tests can detect cancer early, which is of great help to the treatment of patients. So what does high carbohydrate antigen mean? Let's take a look.

First, what does high carbohydrate antigen mean? Carbohydrate antigen CA153. It is the most important specific marker for breast cancer. It has central clinical significance for diagnosing breast cancer patients, monitoring postoperative recurrence, and observing therapeutic effects. 30%-50% of breast cancer patients have significantly elevated CA15-3. Of course, the carbohydrate antigen CA153 also has a certain positive rate for other malignant tumors.

Second, carbohydrate antigen CA199. It is closely related to gastrointestinal cancer and can assist in the diagnosis of malignant tumors such as pancreatic cancer and gallbladder cancer. It is recognized as the most sensitive marker for pancreatic cancer. In addition, the levels of carbohydrate antigen CA199 in patients with other gastrointestinal cancers such as liver cancer, gastric cancer, colorectal cancer, ovarian cancer, breast cancer, and lung cancer also increase to varying degrees. Of course, some gastrointestinal inflammations and chronic diseases can also lead to elevated levels of carbohydrate antigen CA199.

Third, the carbohydrate antigen CA50 is a sialic acid ester and sialic acid glycoprotein , and is also the most commonly used carbohydrate antigen tumor marker. Because it is widely present in the pancreas, stomach, liver, gallbladder, bladder, colorectum, and uterus, the carbohydrate antigen CA50 is more widely used than CA199 in clinical practice. Therefore, the carbohydrate antigen CA50 is not a tumor marker specific to a certain organ. Different CA50 positivity rates can be detected in many malignant tumors, such as 66.6% of lung cancer, 88.2% of liver cancer, 68.9% of gastric cancer, 88.5% of ovarian or cervical cancer, 94.4% of pancreatic or bile duct cancer, and more than 70% of others such as rectal cancer and bladder cancer are elevated.

What does high carbohydrate antigen mean? Many people are found to have high levels of certain carbohydrate antigens during health checks, but they have certain misunderstandings about "what high carbohydrate antigen means" and are worried that it is cancer. Therefore, they feel very scared and carry a serious mental and psychological burden. It is necessary to emphasize here that just one physical examination showing high levels of carbohydrate antigen, or just a certain type of carbohydrate antigen being high, cannot be 100% certain that it is cancer. What you need to know is that carbohydrate antigen is only a means of assisting the discovery and diagnosis of cancer. It has a certain reference value, but it cannot be equated with cancer. Therefore, if this happens, further examination or reexamination is needed, and a conclusion can only be drawn based on various indicators and symptoms, and even a puncture biopsy may be required for a confirmed diagnosis.