Objective: To investigate the relationship between the changes of salivary epidermal growth factor (sEGF) concentration and oromaxillofacial tumors so as to find out its potential clinical value.
Methods: The saliva of 123 patients with oromaxillofacial tumors,inflammations and precancerous lesions were measured for EGF concentration by radioimmunoassay (RIA) with the ligand(125)I-EGF and the saliva of 40 normal adults as the control.
Results: Compared with the control, sEGF level of malignant,benign salivary gland tumors increased obviously;the former is higher than the latter significantly. The sEGF levels of patients with squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) of mucosa,recurrence and precancerous lesion were significantly higher than that of the control. There was no significant difference among the groups,but there was a tendency to increase by degrees. Compared with the control,the increase of the sEGF level of SCC patients with lymph node metastasis was of no significance. The sEGF level of oromaxillofacial inflammation was significantly higher than that of control.
Conclusion: The sEGF levels in patients with salivary gland tumor,SCC,inflammation increased in different degrees.