ABSTRACT
Objective: Endometriosis is a prevalent gynecologic disease affecting 10% of women in reproductive age. Endometriosis is diagnosed by laparoscopy that was followed by histologic confirmation. Early diagnosis will lead to a more effective treatment with much less morbidity. As miR-31 and miR-145 are shown to be directly or indirectly correlated to biological processes involved in endometriosis, the aim of this study was to examine the association of miR-31 and miR-145 expression in plasma with the presence of endometriosis
Materials and Methods: In this case control study, the plasma samples of 55 patients with endometriosis and 23 women without endometriosis were collected, extracted and analyzed by real time quantitative polymerase chain reaction [qPCR] for the expression of miR-145 and miR-31
Results: Our findings showed that miR-31 expression levels in stage 3 or 4 and stage 1 or 2 were significantly down- regulated [less than 0.01-fold, P<0.05], while the expression level of miR-145 was significantly up-regulated in women with endometriosis in stage 1 or 2
Conclusion: Different cellular biological processes, such as differentiation, proliferation, mitochondrial function, reactive oxygen species [ROS] production, invasion and decidualization, are deregulated in endometriosis. miR-31 and miR-145 are microRNAs [miRNAs] with potential roles, as shown in pathologies like cancers. We found that miR- 31 was under-expressed in patients with endometriosis, while miR-145 was over-expressed in stage 1 or 2, indicating that they were relatively down-regulated in the more severe forms. Our findings suggested that these two miRNAs may be considered as potential biomarkers with probable implications in early diagnosis and even follow-up of patients with endometriosis