title: The importance of serial measurements of cytokine levels for the evaluation of their role in pathogenesis in familial Mediterraean fever.
abstract: Familial Mediterranean fever (FMF) is an autosomal recessive disorder characterized by recurrent fever of unknown origin, renal amyloidosis, peritonitis, pleuritis and/or synovitis. There have been many studies to elucidate the etiopathogenesis of FMF. IL-6 is a cytokine that can induce the formation of serum amyloid A and C-reactive protein, both of which are important in development of amyloidosis. IL-6 was determined to be strongly associated in the etiopathogenesis of periodic fever in Chinese-pei dogs. The dogs with this syndrome experience periodic fever, arthritis, renal amyloidosis, a clinical picture very alike of human FMF. Here, we aimed to study mainly whether IL-6 had a similar etiopathogenetic role in human FMF as in Chinese-pei dogs syndrome. The median IL-6 blood levels were found to be higher in patients with acute (n=8) FMF attack (1.85 U/ml) compared to those (n=33) with asymptomatic ones (1.0 U/ml) (p=0.16). There are mainly two results: first; the study should be designed with a larger sample size of patients with acute attack in order to alleviate underestimation of significance, second; sampling time may give various results because of dynamic changes of cytokine levels during acute attack period.
authors.affiliation: Abant Izzet Baysal University, Düzce Medical School, Duzce, Turkey. yakcan@mynet.com
authors.forename: Y
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Akcan
authors.forename: Y
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Bayraktar
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Arslan
authors.forename: D H
authors.initials: DH
authors.lastname: Van Thiel
authors.forename: B C K
authors.initials: BC
authors.lastname: Zerrin
authors.forename: O
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Yildiz
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000818:Animals; D004285:Dogs; D010505:Familial Mediterranean Fever / Q000097:blood* / Q000209:etiology / Q000276:immunology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D015850:Interleukin-6 / Q000097:blood*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D014409:Tumor Necrosis Factor-alpha / Q000378:metabolism*
chemical_list: D015850:Interleukin-6; D014409:Tumor Necrosis Factor-alpha