Cheong JH, Kim GH, Moon JY, Lee BE, Ryu DY, Kim DU, Seo HI, Song GA. Endoscopic ultrasonography in patients with elevated carbohydrate antigen 19-9 of obscure origin. World J Gastrointest Endosc 2013; 5(5): 251-254 [PMID: 23678379 DOI: 10.4253/wjge.v5.i5.251]
Corresponding Author of This Article
Dr. Gwang Ha Kim, MD, Department of Internal Medicine, Pusan National University School of Medicine, and Biomedical Research Institute, Pusan National University Hospital, 1-10, Ami-dong, Seo-gu, Busan 602-739, South Korea. doc0224@pusan.ac.kr
Article-Type of This Article
Brief Article
Open-Access Policy of This Article
This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
World J Gastrointest Endosc. May 16, 2013; 5(5): 251-254 Published online May 16, 2013. doi: 10.4253/wjge.v5.i5.251
Endoscopic ultrasonography in patients with elevated carbohydrate antigen 19-9 of obscure origin
Jae Hoon Cheong, Gwang Ha Kim, Ji Yoon Moon, Bong Eun Lee, Dong Yup Ryu, Dong Uk Kim, Hyung-Il Seo, Geun Am Song
Jae Hoon Cheong, Gwang Ha Kim, Ji Yoon Moon, Bong Eun Lee, Dong Yup Ryu, Dong Uk Kim, Geun Am Song, Department of Internal Medicine, Pusan National University School of Medicine, and Biomedical Research Institute, Pusan National University Hospital, Busan 602-739, South Korea
Hyung-Il Seo, Department of Surgery, Pusan National University School of Medicine, Busan 602-739, South Korea
Author contributions: Kim GH and Song GA designed the research; Moon JY, Lee BE, Ryu DY and Seo HI analyzed the data; Cheong JH and Kim GH wrote the paper; Kim GH and Kim DU performed the research.
Supported by A grant from the National R&D Program for Cancer Control, Ministry for Health, Welfare and Family Affairs, Republic of Korea, No. 0920050; Pusan National University Hospital Clinical Research Grant (2012)
Correspondence to: Dr. Gwang Ha Kim, MD, Department of Internal Medicine, Pusan National University School of Medicine, and Biomedical Research Institute, Pusan National University Hospital, 1-10, Ami-dong, Seo-gu, Busan 602-739, South Korea. doc0224@pusan.ac.kr
Telephone: +82-51-2407869 Fax: +82-51-2448180
Received: May 12, 2012 Revised: September 13, 2012 Accepted: February 5, 2013 Published online: May 16, 2013
Abstract
AIM: To evaluate the efficacy of endoscopic ultrasonography (EUS) in patients with elevated carbohydrate antigen (CA) 19-9 levels of obscure origin.
METHODS: Patients who had visited Pusan National University Hospital because of elevated serum CA 19-9 levels, between January 2007 and December 2009, were retrospectively enrolled. EUS had been performed on all subjects, in addition to routine blood tests, endoscopy, abdominal computed tomography (CT) and other clinical exams, which had not revealed any abnormal findings suggestive of the origin of the elevated CA 19-9 levels.
RESULTS: Of the 17 patients, gallbladder sludge was detected in 16 patients (94.1%) and common bile duct sludge was observed in 3 patients (17.6%). After the administration of ursodeoxycholic acid to 12 of the patients with gallbladder sludge, CA 19-9 levels normalized in 6 of the patients after a median of 4.5 mo.
CONCLUSION: EUS is a useful diagnostic method for patients with elevated CA 19-9 levels of obscure origin, even if the reason for abnormal levels of this serum marker cannot be determined through prior examinations, including abdominal CT.
