RESUMO
Peripheral white blood cell [WBC] count has been shown to be associated with insulin resistance, type 2 diabetes, coronary artery disease [CAD], stroke and diabetes micro-and macrovascular complication. Leptin's hematopoietic or proinflammatory role has been experimentally reported. We investigated whether serum leptin concentrations are associated with white blood cell [WBC] counts in diabetic nephropathy patients of type 2 diabetes mellitus. We studied three groups of patients according to albuminuria level: normal [18 patients], micrialbuminuria [17 patients] and third group with overt proteinuria [21 patients]. The total and differential leukocyte profiles of peripheral blood were measured and plasma leptin was examined by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. In our study, we showed a significant higher leptin level [p= 0.0 5] and neutrophilic counts [p= 0.017] in diabetic nephropathy patients but failed to show an association between leptin level and TLC or neutrophilia. Our study confirmed a significant hyperliptenemic state and higher neutrophilic counts in diabetic nephropathy patients of type 2 diabetes mellitus. These finding might be reinforcement of importance of inflammation in the pathogenesis of this microvascular complication of diabetes