Plasma D-Dimer and Fibrinogen Levels Correlates with Tumor Size and Disease Progression in Nigerian Breast Cancer Patients

Abstract

Fourty-five breast cancer patients and 50 apparently healthy sex-matched controls from the University of Ilorin Teaching Hospital were enrolled in this study. Plasma D-dimer and fibrinogen were found to be significantly higher than controls; APTT was significantly shorter than the controls. D-dimer and fibrinogen were also significantly positively correlated with ECOG, disease stage, lymph node involvement, and tumor size. On multivariate analysis, D-dimer and fibrinogen were found to be independently related to lymph node involvement. This study shows that plasma D-dimer and fibrinogen levels are elevated in breast cancer patients, and both are markers of disease progression.

Keywords:

• D-dimer
• D-dimer-fibrinogen ratio
• fibrinogen
• breast cancer
• lymph nodes

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank all the patients who have generously given their time to be involved in this study and the resident doctors of the surgical oncology clinics especially Dr. Fashiku and Dr. Aremu for their contribution towards patient selection.

Ethical approval

Ethical approval was given by the UITH Ethical Research Committee (Approval number: ERC PAN/2015/12/1483).

Author contributions

OI was involved in the design of the study, data analysis, and writing of the first draft manuscript. OA, HO, SO were involved in the design of the study, coordination, and corrections of the draft manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Disclosure statement

The authors declare that they have no competing interests

Data availability statement

The datasets generated and analyzed during this study are available from the medical records at the surgical oncology clinic of the University of Ilorin Teaching Hospital.