Background Chronic liver disease and cirrhosis are of the major health concern worldwide. Assessment of liver fibrosis is necessary to determine disease severity and prognosis at the time of presentation to determine suitable treatment. Liver biopsy is considered as standard golden method in diagnosis of liver fibrosis. However, this procedure is invasive; thus, multiple laboratory and radiologic tests are used to help determination of the degree of fibrosis. Growth differentiation factor 15 (GDF-15) is a pleiotropic cytokine involved in regulating inflammatory and apoptotic pathways. It is suggested that GDF-15 plays an important role in pathogenesis of liver fibrosis. In this study, we aimed to evaluate efficiency of growth differentiation factor 15 in diagnosing liver fibrosis. The study was a case-control study conducted on 55 chronic HCV patients recruited from hepatitis C virus clinic at Faculty of Medicine Ain Shams Research Institute (MASRI), and 30 healthy subjects age- and sex-matched. The patients were classified into three subgroups according to the degree of liver fibrosis assessed by fibro-scan. Serum concentration of GDF-15 was determined by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. Results Our results revealed a highly significant statistical rise in GDF-15 levels among studied chronic HCV patients with liver fibrosis when compared to the control group (p < 0.01). Furthermore, there was a significant positive correlation between the degree of fibrosis assessed by fibro-scan and GDF-15 serum levels. Levels of GDF-15 were significantly higher in patients with mild degree of fibrosis (patients’ subgroup І) when compared with the controls’ group (p < 0.01) suggesting the role of this marker in early detection of liver fibrosis. A statistically significant increase in serum GDF-15 levels was noticed among patients with advanced fibrosis “subgroup ІІІ” compared to those with mild fibrosis “subgroup І” (p < 0.05). The diagnostic sensitivity and specificity of GDF-15 were 96.7%, 98.2%, respectively at a cut-off value of 150 ng/L for discrimination between patients’ and controls’ groups. Conclusion Growth differentiation factor 15 could be a potential marker of liver fibrosis especially in early detection as its levels were significantly higher in patients’ group with liver fibrosis than controls’ group and there was a significant positive correlation between the degree of liver fibrosis and GDF-15 serum levels.
Background Chronic liver disease and cirrhosis are a major health concern worldwide being the sixth leading cause of all-cause mortality in people aged 25–64 years. Assessment of liver fibrosis is necessary to determine disease severity and prognosis at the time of presentation to determine suitable treatment. The gold standard method of diagnosis is liver biopsy; however, this procedure is invasive; thus, multiple laboratory and radiologic tests are used to help determine the degree of fibrosis. Growth differentiation factor 15 (GDF-15) is a pleiotropic cytokine involved in regulating inflammatory and apoptotic pathways. It plays a role in cardiovascular disease, inflammation, body weight regulation and cancer. It is suggested that GDF-15 plays an important role in pathogenesis of liver fibrosis. Aim of the Work In this study we aimed to evaluate efficiency of growth differentiation factor 15 in diagnosing liver fibrosis. Patients and Methods The study was a case- control study conducted on 55 chronic HCV patients recruited from Hepatitis C virus Clinic at Faculty of Medicine Ain Shams Research Institute (MARSI), and 30 healthy subjects age and sex matched. The patients were classified into three subgroups according to the degree of liver fibrosis assessed by fibro-scan. Serum concentration of GDF-15 was determined by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA). Results Results of our study revealed a highly significant statistical rise in GDF-15 levels among studied chronic HCV patients with liver fibrosis when compared to the control group (p < 0.01). Furthermore, there was a significant positive correlation between the degree of fibrosis assessed by fibro-scan and GDF-15 serum levels. Levels of GDF-15 were significantly higher in patients with mild degree of fibrosis (patients’ subgroup І when compared with the controls’ group (p < 0.01) suggesting the role of this marker in early detection of liver fibrosis. A statistically significant increase in serum GDF-15 levels was noticed among patients with advanced fibrosis “subgroup ІІІ” compared to those with mild fibrosis “subgroup І” (p < 0.05). The diagnostic sensitivity and specificity of GDF-15 were 96.7%, 98.2%, respectively at a cutoff value of 150 ng/L for discrimination between patients’ and controls’ groups. Conclusion Growth differentiation factor 15 could be a potential marker of liver fibrosis especially in early detection as its levels were significantly higher in patients’ group with liver fibrosis than controls’ group and there was a significant positive correlation between the degree of liver fibrosis and GDF-15 serum levels.
Hemodialysis (HD), despite being the most common treatment modality for endstage renal disease (ESRD), still carries a mortality rate higher than 20-50%/year resulting from various comorbidities. The aim of this study was to measure the plasma level of pentraxin-3 (PTX-3) in patients on maintenance HD and to assess its relationships to comorbidities such as malnutrition and associated comorbid diseases. This case-control study included 50 HD patients, 30 ESRD patients, and 30 healthy controls. HD patients were classified into different subgroups according to the Davies comorbidity index and malnutrition score. Plasma PTX-3 was analyzed by a sandwich ELISA technique. Plasma level of PTX-3 reached its highest levels in HD patients followed by ESRD patients as compared to healthy controls. Moreover, within the different subgroups, the highest levels and the highest odd ratio of PTX-3 were detected in the subgroups having the highest Davies comorbidity index or the highest malnutrition score as compared to the other subgroups. At a cutoff of 0.6 ng/mL, PTX-3 was able to discriminate HD patients with low Davies comorbidity index from those with both medium and high Davies comorbidity index with a diagnostic sensitivity of 92.5% and a diagnostic specificity of 70.0%. Meanwhile, the best cutoff of plasma PTX-3 for discriminating patients with mild malnutrition from severe and moderate malnutrition was 0.6 ng/mL with a diagnostic sensitivity of 90.9% and a diagnostic specificity of 41.2%. In conclusion, PTX-3 appears to be a clinically useful marker for the early identification of patients with renal failure on maintenance HD who are at substantially increased risk of morbidity. These patients may require care and aggressive follow-up in more specialized units and an early referral to a renal transplant center.
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