C-reactive protein, procalcitonin, interleukin-6, vascular endothelial growth factor and oxidative metabolites in diagnosis of infection and staging in patients with gastric cancer

Table 1 Characteristics of studied populations and demo-graphic data

	No. of subjects	Median age (yr)(interquartile range)	Sex(M/F)
Healthy control	23	61 (38-82)	11/12
Gastric cancer	42	62 (46-76)	19/23
Histologic type
Adeno carcinoma	34	61 (46-76)	18/16
Signet-ring cell carcinoma	4	51 (48-62)	3/1
Mucinous carcinoma	4	56 (51-58)	1/3
Stage
I	12	60 (46-74)	7/5
II	16	56 (51-64)	8/8
III	10	65 (62-72)	4/6
IV1	4	70 (68-76)	2/2

M, male; F, female.

¹Distant metastatic sites: peritoneal (2), he-patic (1), multiple sites (1).

Table 2 Mean levels of VEGF, IL-6, PCT, CRP, MDA and NO in controls, cancer patients and in infection and non-infection groups of cancer patients

	Control (n = 23)	Gastric cancer (n = 42)	P value	Non-infection group (n = 23)	Infection group (n = 19)	P value
VEGF (pg/mL)	51.26 ± 30.04	489.28 ± 172.91b	< 0.000	462.84 ± 165.46	521.28 ± 180.72	NS
IL-6 (pg/mL)	1.41 ± 0.34	4.68 ± 2.00b	< 0.000	3.47 ± 0.77	6.15 ± 2.07d	< 0.000
PCT (ng/mL)	0.15 ± 0.065	0.59 ± 0.29b	< 0.000	0.42 ± 0.19	0.79 ± 0.27d	< 0.000
CRP (mg/L)	15.30 ± 11.28	78.21 ± 43.36b	< 0.000	57.83 ± 16.45	102.89 ± 52.71d	< 0.002
MDA(nmol/mL)	4.37 ± 2.99	11.42 ± 3.22b	< 0.000	9.85 ± 2.12	13.32 ± 3.35d	< 0.001
NO (µmol/L)	37.97 ± 6.35	49.32 ± 9.07b	< 0.000	45.79 ± 9.16	53.59 ± 7.06d	< 0.004

^bP < 0.000 vs control,

^dP < 0.005 vs non-infection group, NS: not significant.

Table 3 Mean serum levels of VEGF, IL-6, PCT, CRP, MDA and NO in different stages of cancer patients

	Stage I (n = 12)	Stage II (n = 16)	Stage III (n = 10)	Stage IV (n = 4)
VEGF (pg/mL)	331.92 ± 106.45	471.85 ± 113.57b	580.87 ± 94.64dg	802.14 ± 128.57d,l,h
IL-6 (pg/mL)	5.05 ± 2.89	4.16 ± 1.28	4.03 ± 0.81	7.33 ± 1.13lf
PCT (ng/mL)	0.63 ± 0.37	0.56 ± 0.32	0.57 ± 0.23	0.67 ± 0.22
CRP (mg/L)	82.08 ± 61.92	77.75 ± 38.21	62.50 ± 21.41	107.75 ± 30.27e
MDA (nmol/mL)	8.99 ± 2.39	11.25 ± 2.66a	12.34 ± 2.03b	17.07 ± 2.06dnf
NO (µmol/L)	41.11 ± 6.36	48.34 ± 7.06a	54.84 ± 3.82dg	64.16 ± 3.72dlf

^bP < 0.005,

^aP < 0.05,

^dP < 0.000 vs stage I.,

^lP < 0.000,

ⁿP < 0.001,

^gP < 0.05 vs stage II.,

^fP < 0.001,

^eP < 0.05 vs stage III.

Table 4 Pearson’s rank correlation coefficients between each two of serum/plasma MDA, NO, VEGF and IL-6 levels in gastric cancer patients

MDA-NO	MDA-VEGF	MDA-IL-6	VEGF-IL-6	VEGF-NO	IL-6-NO
r = 0.674 P < 0.000	r = 0.556 P < 0.000	r = 0.434 P < 0.004	r = 0.192 PV NS	r = 0.535 P < 0.000	r = 0.534 P < 0.000

NS.: not significant.