On Complement-fixation in Malignant Disease

Through the researches of Wassermann and his collaborators it has been established that syphilitic sera may contain substances which in the presence of other substances derived from syphilitic organs are capable of fixing complement, so that upon the subsequent addition of red corpuscles and homologous hemolytic amboceptor hemolysis is impeded. This phenomenon was originally interpreted as meaning that as a consequence of the syphilitic infection specific antibodies are formed which enter into combination with the corresponding antigen--present in syphilitic organs--and that the resultant product is capab!e of binding complement. Subsequent study has shown that this conception does not satisfactorily account for the facts observed since similar fixation of complement on the part of syphilitic serum may occur in the presence of nonsyphilitic tissue extracts. While a different interpretation of the phenomenon must accordingly be sought, the fact remains that substances are formed in the body of syphilitic individuals which will react with certain tissue constituents and bind complement and that the reaction may in a certain measure be regarded as specific. Wassermann states in a recent communication that approximately a thousand cases have been examined, up to the end of the previous year, from which the diagnostic value of the reaction (ergo, its specificity) is uniformly apparent. Our own work had already been planned at a time when the antigen-antibody interpretation of the syphilitic reaction had not yet been set aside, and when it seemed that the same principle might well be utilized in a search for antibodies in malignant disease. The applicability of the method in the study of pathological conditions, in which the causative agent is unknown, had indeed