If my carcinoembryogenic antigen (CEA) level is 2698 ng/ml how bad is my prognosis?

Question

I know is metastasic cáncer, 3 months ago was in 651 ng/ml.
Please the truth.

We don´t know where the primary is, and after 15 radiations and 2 cicles of Xeloda, I ´m thinking is better quit quimio.

Answer 1

the level is very important but so is the primary cancer, the metastatic lesions, complications with the primary tumor etc. I am sorry to know that it is so high but please stay in touch with your oncologist to see when and what treatment options are better, good luck

Answer 2

CEA, like any other tumor marker, is useful for monitoring tumor progress. The important issue here is the fact that the CEA level has gone up after your chemotherapy, meaning your cancer (of unknown primary?) has progressed and is not responding to treatment. This info should be used along with other data, like CT scans and how you're doing clinically. The level itself really does not provide much prognostic data. It's probably reasonable to think that a level of 2600 is worse than 1000, but how much worse is really unknown. Depending on how you're doing, you should talk w/ your oncologist about the treatment, as there may well be other treatments or clinical trials that may be suitable for you, and hopefully with the least amount of side effects possible. The goal of treatment is not to make you feel worse, it's to allow you to have the maximum amount of time with a reasonable quality of life.