Risk of recurrence of malignant tumors of the ovaries and levels of tumor markers НЕ-4 and СА-125

Background. Timely diagnosis of recurrence of malignant tumors of the ovaries can improve treatment outcomes. Purpose – determine the feasibility of using the tumor marker HE-4 in case of recurrence of malignant ovarian tumors. Materials and methods. To analyze the levels of HE-4 and CA-125 in patients with recurrence of malignant ovarian tumors and determine the feasibility of using HE-4 at this stage of monitoring, 29 patients with known indicators of HE-4 and CA-125 at the time of recurrence and their baseline data were selected. Results and discussion. The paper presents the results of the study of the HE-4 and CA-125 tumor markers levels in 29 patients with a proven recurrence of malignant ovarian neoplasms depending on the timing of its appearance – up to 12 months (n = 9), 13–24 months (n = 11) and after 24 months (n = 9). The values of the tumor-associated HE-4 marker were decreased during the relapse compared to baseline expression levels. When analyzing of the HE-4 serum, their significant difference was revealed only in the event of relapse in the period of up to one year (1207.00 pmol/l) from recurrence rates in the periods of 13–24 and of over 24 months (567.00 and 655.50 pmol/l, respectively). Conclusions. Only the baseline expression of HE-4 is prognostically significant for determining the timing of recurrence of ovarian malignancies.