Summary On The Prevalence Of Serum VCA-IgA Antibody Among Thai Patients With Lymphoma: An Implication For Risk And Screening Purpose

Lymphoma is a common hematological malignancy. Relationship with the Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) was indicated. Anti-EBV serology, immunoligcal test for detection of EBV infection is applied for screening and detection of lymphoma. Of several tests, lgA antibody to viral capsid antigens of Epstein-Barr virus (VCA-lgA antibody) has been mentioned as a valuable test for screening for and early detection of lymphoma. Here, the author performs an appraisal on the prevalence of serum VCA-lgA antibody among Thai patients with lymphoma comparing with healthy control subjects. According to the literature review, 2 reports [6, 7] were recruited for further metanalysis. According to the metanalysis, 39 cases and 252 healthy subjects were investigated for serum VCA-lgA antibody. The overall antibody positive rate in the patients and healthy subjects are 35.9 % (14/39) and 2.4 % (6/252), respectively. The odds ratio is 22.96. According to this study, it could be seen that having serum VCA-lgA antibody positive is a very high risk for lymphoma. Of interest, although the lymphoma is high prevalent in Thailand there is no specific recommendation in screening for this disease in high risk population. According to this study, the results suggested that the EBV-specific serum IgA antibodies might be a useful screening test for the cancer in people of high risk.