Clinical values of serum neuron-specific enolase in lung cancer

Objective To study the clinical values of neuron-specific enolase(NSE) as serum tumor marker in lung cancer.Methods The serum NSE levels in 96 patients with lung cancer,60 patients with begnign pulmonary disease and 60 healthy controls were measured by using enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay.Results The levels of NSE in serum in patients with lung cancer was significantly higher than those in healthy subjects and patients with begnign lung disease(P0.001),the level and positive rate of NSE in patients with small cell lung cancer(SCLC) were higher than those of patients with adenocarcinoma or squamous cell carcinoma(P0.001).An elevated NSE level was found more frequently in patients with extensive disease of SCLC than those in patients with limited disease,but no significant positive correlation was found between serum NSE level and TNM staging in non-small cell lung cancer patients(P0.05).The effective rate of chemotherapy were 87.10%,40.00% and 66.67%, 33.33% in patients with SCLC and NSCLC,respective for NSE positive and negative ones(P0.05).(Conclusion NSE can) be used as a useful tumor marker in patients with lung cancer.