ABSTRACT
ABSTRACT The development of early detection biomarkers is of special importance for pancreatic cancer, a devastating disease with poor prognosis and one of the most aggressive human malignancies. Despite considerable development in sophisticated imaging techniques and cytological examination, pancreatic cancer is most often diagnosed late in the course of the disease, after local spread and distant metastases have already occurred. Since pancreatic cancer is very difcult to treat, the key to the management of this disease are understanding of the molecular basis of transformation into malignant tumor of the pancreas and identication of molecular markers that can be used for early detection of the disease in the clinical practice. Although many molecular markers have been examined in pancreatic cancer, none are considered to be sufciently specic and sensitive for preoperative diagnosis. Altered serum levels of CA 19-9 and mutated K-RAS gene are often used in clinical practice as markers of pancreatic malignancy. However, their sensitivity and specicity are relatively low and the use of other markers in combination with these two is necessary to improve diagnostic accuracy.
