Wnt/β-Catenin Pathway Proteins in End-Stage Renal Disease

Abstract

Aim: To delineate the association of end-stage renal disease (ESRD) and Wnt-proteins including the agonist R-spondin-1, the transducer β-catenin and the antagonists DKK1 and sclerostin. Materials & methods: Serum Wnt-pathway proteins levels were measured by ELISA in 60 ESRD patients and 30 normal controls. Results: DKK1 and sclerostin were significantly higher in ESRD than in controls, and β-catenin and the catenin + R-sponin-1/DKK1 + sclerostin ratio, reflecting the ratio of agonist and transducer on antagonists (AT/ANTA), were significantly lower in ESRD. Estimated glomerular filtration rate was significantly associated with DKK1 and sclerostin (inversely), β-catenin (positively) and the AT/ANTA ratio (r = 0.468, p < 0.001). Conclusion: Wnt/β-catenin pathway proteins show significant alterations in ESRD, indicating significantly increased levels of antagonists.

Correlation between DKK-1 Level and Bone Density Status in Children on Maintenance Haemodialysis

“…This build-up leads to a decline in Wnt/β-catenin signalling in osteoblasts, which increases the expression of Wnt signalling inhibitors like DKK-1. [16] and [17] have also reported similar findings.…”

In end-stage kidney disease, inflammation, erythron abnormalities and declined kidney function tests are accompanied by increased affective symptoms, chronic-fatigue, and fibromyalgia

“…This suggests that shared pathways may explain the affective and physiosomatic symptoms of ESRD. In addition, we were able to demonstrate that affective and physiosomatic symptoms belong to the same shared core in a variety of other medical conditions, including acute COVID-19 infection, Long COVID, schizophrenia, type 2 diabetes mellitus, and unstable angina (Al-Hakeim et al, 2022a; Al-Hakeim et al, 2022b; Al-Hakeim et al, 2022c; Al-Hakeim et al, 2021). Consequently, mental (psychiatric) and somatic (physiosomatic) symptoms are intrinsically linked and driven by various ESRD-related pathways, as discussed below.…”

“…Lowered serum zinc levels are also detected in patients with CFS (Maes et al, 2006). Reduced serum calcium levels are associated with depressive and CFS-like symptoms which appear in acute COVID-19 infection and Long COVID (Al-Jassas et al, 2022; Maes et al, 2022), whilst increased serum copper is associated with affective symptoms in type-2 diabtes mellitus and CFS-like symptoms in hemodialysis patients (Al-Hakeim et al, 2021; Asad et al, 2023). Nevertheless, there are no data on whether in end-stage ESRD, affective, physiosomatic, fatigue and fibromyalgia symptoms are associated with abnormalities in kidney function tests, disorders in the erythron, lowered zinc and calcium and increased copper levels.…”

Influence of Muscle Mass and Strength on Bone Mineralisation with Consideration of Sclerostin Concentration

“…On the other hand, perhaps an age-related decrease in glomerular filtration rate results in the persistence of increased sclerostin values [ 43 ]. This explanation appears to have a strong basis, in view of the fact that sclerostin levels have been shown to be increased in both patients with acute kidney injury [ 44 ] and patients with chronic kidney dysfunction [ 44 , 45 , 46 ]. Similar findings in relation to the positive correlation of sclerostin concentration and bone density were demonstrated by Sharma-Ghimire P. et al In this study, young adults (20–30 years) and middle-aged premenopausal women (35–45 years) were compared to each other.…”