Tumor markers are noninvasive diagnostic tools for cancer. Their abnormal expression often occurs earlier than clinical symptoms or other detection signals. Appropriate reference intervals (RIs) of tumor markers are important for health evaluation, cancer diagnosis, therapy monitoring and prognosis assessment. In this study, we aimed to establish the RIs of cancer antigen 125 (CA125), CA15-3, CA19-9, CA72-4, alpha fetoprotein (AFP), carcino-embryonic antigen (CEA), neuron-specific enolase (NSE) and cytokeratin 19 fragment antigen 21-1 (CYFRA21-1) in apparently healthy Henan population. A total of 1705 apparently healthy participants (21-89 years) were recruited from five representative geographical regions in Henan province. Nonparametric 95th percentile intervals were used to define the RIs of CA125, CA15-3, CA19-9, CA72-4, AFP, CEA, NSE and CYFRA21-1. The test results of CA125, CA15-3, CA19-9, CA72-4, AFP, CEA, NSE and CYFRA21-1 can traceable to reference measurement procedures. The age- and gender-specific RIs of the tumor markers were established. We established age- and gender-specific RIs for CA125, CA15-3, CA19-9, CA72-4, AFP, CEA, NSE and CYFRA21-1. The newly established RIs should be more suitable for Henan population. It will be valuable for clinicians to make a medical diagnosis, therapeutic management decision and other physiological assessment.
Keywords: Cancer; confidence intervals; healthy; reference intervals; tumor markers.