Serum detection of thymidine kinase 1 as a means of early detection of lung cancer.

Background: Thymidine kinase 1 (TK1) is a biomarker elevated in several malignancies, including lung cancer. Up-regulation of TK1 is an early event in carcinogenesis and therefore a target for early cancer detection. We have developed a novel Enzyme Linked Immunosorbent Assay (ELISA) to detect TK1 in serum.

Materials And Methods: Forty patients with pulmonary nodules and 18 healthy individuals had their serum collected prior to surgery. All samples were analyzed using a radioassay and ELISA.

Results: TK1 was significantly elevated in all lung cancer samples. Patients with stage I (n=16) and stage II (n=17) disease had significantly higher TK1 levels than controls. The area under the curve was 0.792, using 4.9 nM TK1 as cut-off, for early-stage lung cancer. The sensitivity and specificity were 75.0 and 83.3, respectively. TK1 concentration was a more sensitive and accurate indicator of lung cancer than TK1 activity.

Conclusion: TK1 is significantly elevated in serum from patients with stage I and stage II lung cancer as measured using the established ELISA. This novel TK1 ELISA is both sensitive and specific for the detection of early-stage and advanced lung cancer, and therefore may be an important tool in the management of this disease.