Salivary Ferritin Changes in Patients with COVID-19

Abstract

High ferritin serum levels can be found in patients with macrophage activation syndrome, and increased serum ferritin due to cytokine storm have been reported in severe COVID-19 patients. Saliva is being increasingly used in COVID-19 tests as a diagnostic sample for virus detection and quantification. This study aimed to evaluate the possible changes in ferritin in saliva in COVID-19 patients. In addition, the effects of different inactivation SARS-CoV-2 treatments in ferritin measurements in saliva, the correlation between ferritin in saliva and serum, and the possible effects of correction of ferritin values by total protein were assessed. Ferritin was measured in saliva from healthy (n = 30) and COVID-19 (n = 65) patients with severe, (n = 18) or mild (n = 47) disease, depending on the need for nasal flow oxygen or assisted respiration. Ferritin was also measured in paired serum and saliva samples (n = 32) from healthy and COVID-19 patients. The evaluated inactivation protocols did not affect the assay’s results except the addition of 0.5% SDS. Significantly higher ferritin was found in the saliva of COVID-19 patients (median; 25–75th percentile) (27.75; 9.77–52.2 µg/L), compared with healthy controls (4.21; 2.6–8.08 µg/L). Individuals with severe COVID-19 showed higher ferritin values in saliva (48.7; 18.7–53.9) than mild ones (15.5; 5.28–41.3 µg/L). Significant correlation (r = 0.425; p < 0.001) was found between serum and saliva in ferritin. Ferritin levels were higher in COVID-19 patients in serum and saliva, and the highest values were found in those patients presenting severe symptomatology. In conclusion, ferritin in saliva has the potential to be a biomarker to evaluate severity in patients with COVID-19.

Inactivation Protocols for African Swine Fever Virus in Serum and Saliva Samples

“…Then, these detergent concentrations and 95 °C heating were tested in a battery of biomarkers that are applied in porcine medicine, including markers of stress, inflammation, immune system and oxidative status. The final inactivation protocols presented here agree with previously related data on detergent-treatment [13,[19][20][21] These protocols have the additional advantage that they employ economical reagents and do not need expensive infrastructure.…”

Impact of ASFV Detergent Inactivation on Biomarkers in Serum and Saliva Samples

“…Then, these detergent concentrations and 95 °C heating protocols were tested in a battery of biomarkers that are applied in porcine medicine, including markers of stress, inflammation, the immune system, and oxidative status. The final inactivation protocols presented here agree with previously published data on the use of detergent treatment [ 13 , 20 , 21 , 22 ] to inactivate various viruses. These protocols have additional advantages in that they employ economical reagents and do not need expensive infrastructure.…”

Evaluation of Serum Ferritin, Procalcitonin, and C-Reactive Protein for the Prediction of Severity and Mortality in Hemorrhagic Fever With Renal Syndrome

“…Ferritin has been identified as an important molecule in the host immune system that can reflect the cellular defense against inflammatory response ( Valero et al, 2019 ). Studies also have confirmed ferritin as a potential biomarker in the diagnosis of viral and bacterial infection, as well as macrophage-activation syndrome and hemophagocytic lymphohistiocytosis ( Barut et al, 2010 ; Kyriazopoulou et al, 2017 ; Franco-Martinez et al, 2021 ; Zhou J. et al, 2021 ). Patients with HFRS appear to have a higher level of serum ferritin and PCT ( Tjendra et al, 2020 ).…”