An early marker of monoclonal light chain protein In bladder cancer

Abstract

Bladder cancer complicating schistosomiasis is a major cause of cancer mortality in Egypt. It affects farmers who suffer from repeated and severe chronic schistosomal cystitis. The late presentation of this disease is probably due to the overlapping and similar symptoms of simple bilharzial cystitis and bladder carcinoma. The present work deals with study of the variation of low molecular weight proteins, immunoprotein-patterns present in both serum and urine in different groups of bladder cancer patients in an attempt for predicting and screening the early and late stages of bladder carcinoma. The increased urinary excretion of high molecular weight proteins, the immunoglobulins (IgA, IgM, IgG) especially IgG and low molecular weight proteins such as light chain protein of kappa (K) as well as B-2-microglobulin demonstrated in our patients of bladder carcinomas in the present study may be caused by the admixture of proteins to urine from tumour surface. The increased level of IgG type kappa in urine could also be related to the high degree of plasma cell infiltration usually associated with bladder tumours, or it may be due to alteration in the genetic material present in the chromosomes of the nucleic acid components of cells which is the basis for their transformation into neoplasms. On conclusion, our results demonstrated that detection of monoclonal light chain proteins can be used for diagnosis and predicting the early or late stages of the disease and its different pathological types.