Yang M, Zhang CY. Diagnostic biomarkers for pancreatic cancer: An update. World J Gastroenterol 2021; 27(45): 7862-7865 [PMID: 34963749 DOI: 10.3748/wjg.v27.i45.7862]
Corresponding Author of This Article
Ming Yang, DVM, PhD, Postdoctoral Fellow, Department of Surgery, University of Missouri, One Hospital Dr., Medical Science Building, Room M272, Columbia, MO 65212, United States. yangmin@health.missouri.edu
Research Domain of This Article
Oncology
Article-Type of This Article
Letter to the Editor
Open-Access Policy of This Article
This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
World J Gastroenterol. Dec 7, 2021; 27(45): 7862-7865 Published online Dec 7, 2021. doi: 10.3748/wjg.v27.i45.7862
Diagnostic biomarkers for pancreatic cancer: An update
Ming Yang, Chun-Ye Zhang
Ming Yang, Department of Surgery, University of Missouri, Columbia, MO 65212, United States
Chun-Ye Zhang, Department of Veterinary Pathobiology, University of Missouri, Columbia, MO 65212, United States
Author contributions: Yang M and Zhang CY collected data, wrote, finalized the letter, and contributed equally.
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors declare no conflicts of interest.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Ming Yang, DVM, PhD, Postdoctoral Fellow, Department of Surgery, University of Missouri, One Hospital Dr., Medical Science Building, Room M272, Columbia, MO 65212, United States. yangmin@health.missouri.edu
Received: July 20, 2021 Peer-review started: July 20, 2021 First decision: August 6, 2021 Revised: August 10, 2021 Accepted: November 24, 2021 Article in press: November 24, 2021 Published online: December 7, 2021 Processing time: 135 Days and 10.3 Hours
Abstract
Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma accounts for the primary type of pancreatic cancer (PC) with a 5-year survival rate of only about 10% in the United States. Early diagnosis will improve chances for curative treatment. To date, a broadly used serum marker for PC diagnosis is carbohydrate antigen 19-9, which is the only approved biomarker currently by the United States Food and Drug Administration. However, it has low specificity; therefore, development of novel biomarkers is urgently needed. Clinical trials are ongoing to evaluate candidate biomarkers for PC diagnosis, and the use of a multi-biomarker panel with current PC diagnostic biomarkers appears promising.
Core Tip: The development of ideal diagnostic biomarkers for pancreatic cancer (PC) is critically important for early diagnosis, large-scale screening, monitoring of therapeutic response, prediction of risk, and prognosis. So far, the only approved serum marker for PC diagnosis is carbohydrate antigen 19-9 (CA 19-9) in the United States; although, many potential biomarkers have been investigated. However, CA 19-9 has low sensitivity; hence, new solutions are needed. Herein, we summarize some of the ongoing clinical trials that aim to investigate the application of biomarkers in PC diagnosis.
