Despite ever-growing experimental evidence for the utility of a wide range
of tumour markers, only a handful are understood to be useful in clinical applications.
Tumour markers are useful for screening and diagnosis of cancers, prognostication,
guiding treatment pathways and post-treatment surveillance studies. The tumour
makers play a significant role in cancer care and the markers included in the current
treatment guidelines will be discussed in detail in this chapter. The utility of the tumour
markers in the management of colorectal, breast, thyroid, hepatobiliary, pancreatic,
ovarian, testicular, neuroendocrine and prostate cancer are detailed herein to provide an
update on the current use of tumour markers in the clinical settings.
Keywords: Alpha-fetoprotein (AFP), Breast cancer, Calcitonin cancer, Cancer treatment, Carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA), Chromogranin A, Colorectal cancer, Current guidelines in cancer care, CA 125, CA 19.9, Follow-up in cancer care, Hepatobiliary cancer, Neuroendocrine tumours, Ovarian cancer, Pancreatic cancer, Prostate cancer, Prostate-specific antigen (PSA), Screening, Surveillance, Testicular cancer, Thyroglobulin (Tg), Thyroid cancer, Tumour markers.
