The utility of usual serum tests for the prognosis of patients with cutaneous metastases

Abstract

Introduction. Cutaneous metastases are usually observed in end-stage cancers. In some cases, the diagnosis of skin metastases is not clinically evident. New studies have found that serological markers, such as fibrinogen and lactate dehydrogenase (LDH), represent predictive factors of cutaneous metastases and could be used in the follow-up. The objective of our study was to evaluate these two markers (fibrinogen and LDH) and to find if there are any correlation between different parameters such as patients’ age, dimensions, and type of the tumour, as well as local complications. Materials and methods. We conducted a retrospective study on 56 patients with cutaneous metastases. We analysed different parameters of patients who underwent skin biopsies or surgical excision, such as age, number, diameter, localization or complications, type of primary neoplasia, other internal organ malignancies, as well as serological levels of LDH and fibrinogen. Results. The study included patients with various types of malignant tumours, most of them with melanoma, followed by different types of adenocarcinomas and leiomyosarcoma. Our cohort also included some rare cases of uterine cervix adenocarcinoma metastases, renal cell metastases and pancreatic metastases. Regarding the serological markers, we identified that fibrinogen correlates with the diameter of the skin nodules, LDH correlates with the age of the patients diagnosed with melanoma, and the two serological parameters correlate with one another. Conclusions. Fibrinogen and LDH can be considered poor prognostic factors for patients with melanoma metastases. As the two markers correlate with one another and with some of the analysed parameters, they could, in the future, be useful to better estimate the malignant disease outcome.

Keywords

• skin metastasis
• cutaneous tumours
• biomarkers
• fibrinogen