Electrophoretic pattern of serum and urinary proteins in nephrotic syndrome

Abstract

Introduction and Aim: Nephrotic syndrome is a pathological condition in which the filtration of blood by the kidneys is defective. Patients with nephrotic syndrome will show abnormal serum albumin and protein levels in the urine. This study aims at filling the gaps in the knowledge of nephrotic syndrome based on the biochemical studies of samples from paediatric patients with the disease. The purpose of this study was to compare and differentiate the protein electrophoretic pattern of the serum and urine of patients having nephrotic syndrome with the time of diagnosis, time since treatment and management, using polyacrylamide gels. Materials and Methods: Nine serum and urine samples of known patients, were collected from clinical biochemistry laboratory, sent for investigations and stored at -80°C till we proceeded with the experiments. The total protein concentration was determined using Biuret method. Protein electrophoresis was then carried out using polyacrylamide gel, which sieves proteins in size range of 5-250 kD. The obtained electrophoretogram was compared for urinary and serum proteins patterns of the same patient, at the time of diagnosis, monitoring during treatment or as the disease progresses. Results: The abnormalities in the lipid profile were noted to complement the electrophoretic results obtained above. On correlation of the urine and serum patterns, we found that the albumin, alpha 2 and beta globulin bands were visible and comparable. Conclusion: Since some proteins other than albumin are comparable in serum and urine, we would like to extend these preliminary findings with the SDS PAGE pattern of urinary and serum proteins to facilitate the investigation of patients not only at the time of onset of the disease, but also at different levels of management of the disease in larger prospective studies.