Correlation Between Serum CA-125 Levels and Age in Advanced-Stage Epithelial Ovarian Cancer Patients at Dr. Soetomo General Academic Hospital, Surabaya, Indonesia (2021-2022)

Ovarian cancer is a gynecological malignancy that originates in the ovaries. Symptoms of ovarian cancer often remain unnoticed in its early stages, leading to a diagnosis at an advanced stage. CA-125 is a widely recognized biomarker used in ovarian cancer for diagnosis, monitoring treatment response, and predicting prognosis. Research has shown that CA-125 levels can vary with age and are influenced by multiple biological factors, including hormonal changes and the progression of ovarian cancer. Age-related factors can influence CA-125 levels, which may affect the interpretation of such examination results. This study aims to determine the correlation between serum CA-125 levels and ages in advanced-stage epithelial ovarian cancer patients. This research is a retrospective study using the comparative analytic research method by taking the medical record data of epithelial ovarian cancer with advanced-stage patients treated in oncology clinic of Dr. Soetomo General Hospital Surabaya for January 1, 2021 – December 2022. Based on the analysis of 61 patient subjects categorized into three age groups, the median serum CA-125 levels for patients aged <40 years were 172.85 U/mL, for those aged 40-50 years the median was 261 U/mL, and for patients aged >50 years the median was 116.2 U/mL. The Kruskal-Wallis test (p-value) yielded a result of 0.518, indicating that there was no statistically significant relationship between serum CA-125 levels of patients and patients’ age (p = 0.518). In addition, there is no correlation between serum CA-125 levels and age in advanced-stage epithelial ovarian cancer patients at Dr. Soetomo General Hospital, Surabaya.