Correlation of Serum Cancer Antigen-125 (CA-125) Levels with Severity of Pre-eclampsia

Pooja Bhatia; Poonam Goel; Reeti Mehra; Sunita Dubey; Seema Gupta

doi:10.1007/s13224-023-01869-2

Correlation of Serum Cancer Antigen-125 (CA-125) Levels with Severity of Pre-eclampsia

J Obstet Gynaecol India. 2023 Dec;73(Suppl 2):240-246. doi: 10.1007/s13224-023-01869-2. Epub 2023 Nov 11.

Authors

Pooja Bhatia¹, Poonam Goel¹, Reeti Mehra¹, Sunita Dubey¹, Seema Gupta²

Affiliations

¹ Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Government Medical College and Hospital, Chandigarh, India.
² Department of Biochemistry, Government Medical College and Hospital, Chandigarh, India.

PMID: 38143976
PMCID: PMC10746686 (available on 2024-12-01)
DOI: 10.1007/s13224-023-01869-2

Abstract

Background: Pre-eclampsia is often associated with unfavourable feto-maternal outcomes. There is a lacuna in its pathophysiology, which emphasizes the need to research for tests, which can predict or correlate with the severity of pre-eclampsia. Cancer antigen-125 (CA-125) is a simple, readily available biomarker with evidence of its secretion at the choriodecidual unit and may have a possible role. This study compared serum CA-125 levels between normal pregnant and pre-eclamptic women and determined its clinical usefulness in correlating with the severity of pre-eclampsia.

Methods: A case-control study was conducted enrolling 58 women with pre-eclampsia further divided into severe and non-severe groups and 62 gestational age-matched healthy, pregnant controls. Serum CA-125 levels were compared between the two groups.

Results: The mean serum CA-125 in the controls was 16.44 ± 8.28 IU/ml, 13.82 ± 9.18 IU/ml in the non-severe and 23.55 ± 30.55 IU/ml in the severe pre-eclampsia group (p = 0.134). Serum CA-125 had a significant association with systolic blood pressure (SBP) p = 0.002), diastolic blood pressure (DBP) (p = 0.026), foetal growth restriction (p = 0.025), pre-term birth (p = 0.039) and a highly significant association with 24-h urinary protein, liver enzymes, placental abruption, need of maternal intensive care as well as with poor neonatal outcome including stillbirth and neonatal mortality (p < 0.001).

Conclusion: Serum CA-125 levels were found to be higher in the severe pre-eclampsia group as compared to non-severe pre-eclampsia and normotensive group, but the difference was not statistically significant. More studies on a larger scale are required to prove the usefulness of this marker with respect to maternal and perinatal outcome as well as its association with pre-eclampsia and its severity.

Keywords: Association; CA-125; Pre-eclampsia; Pregnancy; Severity.

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