Circulating autoantibody to ABCC3 may be a potential biomarker for esophageal squamous cell carcinoma.

PURPOSE: There is an urgent need to identify biomarkers for early diagnosis and prognosis of esophageal cancer. The present study was undertaken to test whether circulating autoantibodies to ATP-binding cassette C3 (ABCC3) transporter could serve as a biomarker for the malignant tumor.

METHODS

An enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay approach was developed in-house to test circulating autoantibodies to ABCC3 in 114 patients with esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) and 226 healthy subjects well matched in age and smoking history.

RESULTS

Mann-Whitney U test showed that the IgA antibody levels were significantly higher in patients with ESCC than control subjects (Z = -4.226, P < 0.001) while the IgG antibody levels were not significantly different between the two groups (Z = -1.072, P = 0.284). The sensitivity against >95 % specificity was 13.2 % for the IgA assay with an inter-assay deviation of 13.0 and 7.9 % for the IgG assay with an inter-assay deviation of 9.4 %.

CONCLUSIONS

This work suggests that circulating IgA autoantibody to ABCC3 may be a potential biomarker for ESCC, which could be used for early diagnosis and prognosis of the malignant tumor.