RADIOIMMUNODETECTION OF OVARIAN-CANCER

Radioimmunoscintigraphy (RIS) is a potentially valuable method for the detection of primary, secondary and recurrent malignant tumours. Anti gens that have been used for monitoring as well as for RIS of ovarian carcinomas include CA 125, FLAP, HMFG, and CA 19-9. Between 70 and 100 % of the tumours have been detected at RIS when these antigens have be en used. Conventional methods, e.g., computerized tomography (CT) and ultrasonography (US), demonstrate similar or lower detection rate than RIS for tumour diagnosis. RIS gives additional information to convent ional radiological methods (CT and US) for the detection of occult ova rian carcinomas. A review of earlier investigations is given and our o wn recent results using FLAP as a target antigen are presented. The fu ture potential of the technology is discussed.