Serum Cystatin C Concentrations in Patients with Graves’ Ophthalmopathy

Purpose@#To evaluate the concentration of serum cystatin C (CysC) in patients with Graves’ ophthalmopathy (GO) and the us-ability of the serum CysC concentrations in the follow-up of the disease. @*Methods@#Thirty patients with GO and 30 healthy age-matched volunteers were included in this cross-sectional study. GO was diagnosed based on the European Group on Graves’ Orbitopathy consensus. Serum thyroid-stimulating hormone, free triiodothyronine, free thyroxine, and CysC concentrations were measured in the participants. The serum CysC concentrations were compared between patients with GO and controls. Patients with GO were subdivided into hyperthyroid and euthyroid patients, and their serum CysC concentrations were compared. In addition, the CysC concentrations in hyperthyroid and eu-thyroid patients with GO were compared separately with those of healthy subjects. Kruskal-Wallis test and Student’s t-test were used for statistical evaluation. @*Results@#The mean serum CysC concentrations in GO patients and controls were 1.04 ± 0.36 and 0.74 ± 0.09 mg/L, respectively.There was a statistically significant difference in the serum CysC concentrations between patients with GO and control subjects (p < 0.001). Fifteen patients had hyperthyroid status, and 15 patients had euthyroid status. The mean serum CysC concentrations in hyperthyroid and euthyroid patients with GO were 1.35 ± 0.22 and 0.72 ± 0.13 mg/L, respectively. Serum CysC concentrations were significantly higher in hyperthyroid patients than in euthyroid patients (p = 0.001). In addition, hyperthyroid patients had significantly higher serum CysC concentrations than healthy subjects. Among patients with GO, 21 and nine had mild and moder-ate-to-severe GO, respectively. Active and inactive GO were observed in eight and 22 patients, respectively. @*Conclusions@#The serum CysC concentrations in hyperthyroid patients were higher than those in healthy subjects. Moreover, hyperthyroid patients had higher serum CysC concentrations than euthyroid patients. Further studies with a larger sample size are needed to confirm these results.

The Relationship between Ghrelin and Copeptin Levels, and Anxiety and Depression Levels in Suicide Attempts

OBJECTIVE: It was aimed to detect acylated ghrelin (AG), unacylated ghrelin (UG) and copeptin levels in patients with suicide attempts and to determine if these biomarkers are risk factors for suicide attempts. METHODS: Serum copeptin, AG and GU levels were screened in 128 patients who were admitted to emergency department with suicide attempts and 59 healthy controls. Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI) and Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) were applied simultaneously, and the data were compared statistically. RESULTS: AG, UG and copeptin levels were higher in the patient group compared with the healthy control group. BAI scores of patients were found to be positively correlated with BDI scores. While there was a significant difference (p=0.0064) between psychiatric and non-psychiatric patients with suicide attempts in terms of BAI scores, there were no differences in BDI scores and levels of biomarkers. We found significantly increased BDI and BAI scores and increased levels of AG, UG and copeptin in psychiatric and non-psychiatric patients compared with healthy individuals. The specificities yielded by receiver operating characteristic curve analysis in patients with suicide attempts were as follows: 91.53% for AG, 72.88% for UG and 94.92% for copeptin. CONCLUSION: Serum levels of AG, UG and copeptin increase with increasing anxiety and depression in patients with suicide attempts. Increased levels of AG, UG and copeptin could be considered a risk factor for suicide attempts.

The effects of low dose leukotriene receptor antagonist therapy on airway remodeling and cysteinyl leukotriene expression in a mouse asthma model

Airway structural changes that occur in patients with asthma in response to persistent inflammation are termed airway remodeling. The cysteinyl leukotrienes (LTC4, D4 and E4) are known to play important roles in the pathobiology of asthma. To evaluate the effect of low dose montelukast (MK) on the development of airway remodeling using a chronic murine model of allergic airway inflammation with subepithelial fibrosis, BALB/c mice, after intraperitoneal ovalbumin (OVA) sensitization on days 0 and 14, received intranasal OVA periodically on days 14-75. MK treated mice received montelukast sodium intraperitoneally on days 26-75. The OVA sensitized/challenged mice developed an extensive eosinophil cell inflammatory response, goblet cell hyperplasia, mucus occlusion, and smooth muscle hypertrophy of the airways. In addition, in OVA sensitized/challenged mice, dense collagen deposition/fibrosis was seen throughout the lung interstitium surrounding the airways, blood vessels, and alveolar septae. The cysteinyl leukotriene 1 (CysLT1) receptor antagonist, MK significantly reduced the airway eosinophil infiltration, goblet cell hyperplasia, mucus occlusion, and lung fibrosis except airway smooth muscle hypertrophy in the OVA sensitized/challenged mice. The OVA sensitized/challenged mice had significantly increased epithelial desquamation compared with control mice. MK markedly reduced epithelial desquamation of airways in OVA/MK treated animals compared with OVA sensitized/challenged mice. MK treatment did not affect the levels of CysLT in lung tissue. Our results show that the important role of cysteinyl leukotrienes in the pathogenesis of asthma. Lower dose of CysLT1 receptor antagonism has a significant anti-inflammatory effect on allergen-induced lung inflammation and fibrosis but not airway smooth muscle hypertrophy in an animal model of asthma.

A Comparison of Estrogen and Two Different Doses of Calcitonin in Ovariectomized Rats

The purpose of this study was to investigate the treatment efficacies of salmon calcitonin (SC) and estrogen in a type-I osteoporotic rat model. Sixty, 3-month-old, female Wistar rats were divided into six groups. The first group was used as the control, and the second a sham, the other four were surgically ovariectomized. 24 hours after the ovariectomy, they were either left untreated (OVX), or treated with an injection of either 17-beta estradiol (E2) 30 mcg/kg/24 hours, low-dose calcitonin (LDC) 10 IU/ kg/48 hours or high-dose calcitonin (HDC) 20 IU/kg/48 hours. 6 weeks later, the bone densities were measured by DEXA, the animals sacrificed and the femurs harvested for histomorphometric evaluation. The bone mineral densities (BMD) of the spine and proximal femur were lower in the OVX group, but only the values of the spine BMD were statistically significant. The BMD of the spine seemed to be preserved with all the treatments. The histomorphometric evaluation revealed that after the OVX the decrease in the trabecular volume was prevented by all the treatments. However, significant changes in the indices of bone formation were not shown. In conclusion, all the treatments prevented bone lost in the ovariectomized rats. Histopathological measurements of bone formation are unlikely to provide any evidence for the effects of these agents on the osteoblastic function. In the animal model of estrogen depletion, our results suggest that the calcitonin provides an important alternative therapy for postmenopausal osteoporosis.