ABSTRACT
Background: Insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF-1) seems to be involved in the neural circuits associated with social cognition and brain structure. Objectives: To investigate the association of IGF-1 levels with social cognition and brain structure in Huntington's disease (HD). Methods: We evaluated social cognition using the Ekman test in 22 HD patients and 19 matched controls. Brain structure was assessed using standard volume-based voxel-based morphometry and surface-based cortical thickness pipeline. We analyzed the association of IGF-1 levels with social cognition and brain structure using adjusted regression analysis. Results: Social cognition was worse in HD patients (P < 0.001), on antidopaminergic drugs (P = 0.02), and with lower IGF-1 levels (P = 0.04). In neuroimaging analyses, lower IGF-1 levels were associated with social cognition impairment and atrophy mainly in frontotemporal regions (P < 0.05 corrected). Conclusions: In HD, abnormal IGF-1 function seems to be associated with brain atrophy leading to clinical deficits in social cognition.
ABSTRACT
Genotyping of ST2 and galectin-3 in atrial fibrillation (AF) is not well analyzed. The aim of our study was to analyze the possible relationship between levels of sST2 and galectin-3 and three polymorphisms in patients with AF. We included 125 patients with persistent AF undergoing electric cardioversion. We analyzed sST2 and galectin-3 levels and three polymorphisms in peripheral blood samples. Rs2274273 was significantly related with levels of galectin-3. Rs1558648 was associated with levels of sST2 but rs13019803 were not. None of the polymorphisms were connected to the variation of biomarkers levels during the follow up. We found a relationship between rs2274273 and galectin-3 levels and rs1558648 and sST2 levels in patients with AF.
Subject(s)
Atrial Fibrillation/genetics , Blood Proteins/genetics , Galectins/genetics , Genetic Predisposition to Disease , Interleukin-1 Receptor-Like 1 Protein/genetics , Aged , Atrial Fibrillation/blood , Atrial Fibrillation/pathology , Atrial Fibrillation/therapy , Biomarkers/blood , Electric Countershock/adverse effects , Female , Galectins/blood , Genotype , Humans , Male , Middle Aged , Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide/geneticsABSTRACT
AIM: To confirm that the carbohydrate antigen 19.9 (CA 19.9) protein can be evaluated by determining changes in the ß2 zone in protein electrophoresis. MATERIALS AND METHODS: A total of 75 patients (64 with cancer, 11 with benign diseases) with abnormal serum CA 19.9 level were included. RESULTS: Patients with cancer had significantly higher serum CA 19.9 concentrations than those with benign diseases (p<0.001). Similar CA 19.9 levels were observed in patients with normal (median 1129 U/ml), weakly positive (median 699 U/ml) and positive (2333 U/ml) ß2 fraction in protein electrophoresis. In contrast, changes in the protein pattern of the ß2 fraction were related to an inflammatory pattern with significantly higher C-reactive protein concentration (p<0.0001), independently of serum CA 19.9 level. CONCLUSION: The intensity of the ß2 fraction in protein electrophoresis is related to inflammation and not to CA 19.9 in patients with cancer or other diseases.