CHEMILUMINESCENCE PRODUCTION BY NEUTROPHILS AND IMMUNE-COMPLEX LEVELSIN CANCER-PATIENTS

We studied the production of chemiluminescence (CL) by peripheral bloo d neutrophils from 24 normal subjects, 13 lung cancer patients with cl inical stages (CS) III and IV, and 27 breast cancer patients with CS I I, III, and IV. Evaluations were made before chemo- and radiotherapy t reatments. CL was expressed as: baseline of the record background acti vity; area under the curve (AUC) of opsonized zymosan response; maximu m peak (MP) response; time to MP (TMP); and total time (TT). Simultane ously, circulating immune complexes (CIC) in sera were evaluated by po lyethylene glycol precipitation technique. The results demonstrated th at lung cancer patients with CS III had an increase of TMP and TT valu es, while breast cancer patients with CS IV showed the lowest values o f AUC and MP compared with the control group. The CIC levels were incr eased in all the cancer patients. There was no correlation between the baseline CL activity and the levels of immune complexes.