Tumor markers are the compounds secreted by a cancer tissue or they are the responsive molecules synthesized against cancer. As these compounds are low or absent in healthy tissues, they are used in the diagnosis and prognosis of cancer. Tumor markers may both increase in blood and body fluids like urine, feces, ascites, pleural fluid, cyst fluid and cerebrospinal fluid. Although tumor markers support the diagnosis of cancers not all the increases in tumor markers may be conidered as cancer.
Tumor markers are tested with various methods in the laboratory. This is he reason why they are considered under a seperate topic in the laboratory medicine.
Tumor markers may be classified according to the type of the cancer they represent;
- Liver cancer and germ cell tumors
- Choriocarcinomas and germ cell tumors
- Ovarian cancer
- Leukemias
- Gastrointestinal stromal tumors or mucosal melanomas
- Breast cancer
- Gastrointestinal system cancers
- Thyroid cancer
- Lymphomas
- Neuroendocrin Tumors
- Bladder Cancer
- Prostate Cancer
- Multiple Myeloma and Waldenstrom Macroglobulinemia
- Melanomas
- Lung Cancers