Differences in plasma TIMP-1 levels between healthy people and patients with rectal cancer stage II or III

BACKGROUND: The purpose of the study was to analyse whether the levels of the tissue inhibitor of matrix metalloproteinases-1 (TIMP-1) are higher in patients with rectal cancer as compared with healthy blood donors. PATIENTS AND METHODS. Two hundred and seventeen patients (147 male, 70 female) with histologically confirmed non-metastatic rectal cancer (clinical stage II–III) and 45 healthy blood donors (15 male, 30 female) were included in analysis. Patient’s mean age was 66 years (range: 34–87 years) and healthy blood donor’s mean age was 35 years (range: 18–64 years). Plasma TIMP-1 concentrations were measured with an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) using commercially available TIMP-1 ELISA kit. Mann-Whitney-test for independent groups was used to assess the differences of plasma TIMP-1 levels and clinicopathological parameters. Two-sided tests were used and the differences at P<0.05 were considered as statistically significant. RESULTS: Median patients TIMP-1 level was 180 ng/mL (range: 22-538 ng/mL); the mean (±SD) level was 193.7 (79.5) ng/mL. The median healthy blood donors TIMP-1 level was 112 ng/mL (range: 48-211 ng/mL); the mean (±SD) level was 115 (35.7) ng/mL. TIMP-1 levels in patients with rectal cancer were statistically significantly higher than TIMP-1 levels in healthy blood donors (P<0.0001). Significant differences in TIMP-1 levels were not found comparing gender (P=0.43), but in both groups TIMP-1 levels were increased with higher age (P=0.007). CONCLUSIONS: Patients with rectal cancer had statistically significantly higher mean and median TIMP-1 level than healthy blood donors which is in accordance with the results published in other publications. These findings suggest possibility that plasma TIMP-1 levels could be used as new biological markers for early cancer detection.