Level of serum vascular endothelial growth factor in patients with breast cancer

Objective To detect the level of serum vascular endothelial growth factor(VEGF)in patients with breast cancer and effect of operation on it,and to investigate its clinical value.Methods Enzyme linked immunosorbent assay(ELISA) was used to detect the level of serum VEGF in 32 cases of normal control subject and 58 cases of patients with breast cancer,compared with 40 patients with breast cancer before and after operation.Results Serum VEGF was correlated with clinical stage,and not with age and pathologic types;level of serum VEGF were elevated in all subgroups of patients with breast cancer compared to the controls(P 0.01),the serum VEGF level in stage Ⅳ was higher in comparison with stage Ⅲ and Ⅱ(P 0.01),in stage Ⅲ it was higher than in stageⅡ(P 0.01),and in stageⅡit was higher than in stageⅠ(P 0.01);the level of serum VEGF was obviously reduced in patients with breast cancer after operation(P 0.01).Conclusions These results suggested that serum VEGF may be involved in the occurrence and development of breast cancer,it may be act as an index to assess the disease status and the prognosis of breast cancer.