Plasma levels of interleukin-6 and interleukin-8 in Chinese patients with non-alcoholic fatty liver disease.
OBJECTIVE
NAFLD with pathological features resembles alcohol-induced liver injury but its pathogenesis remained unclear. IL-6 and IL-8 belonged to pro-inflammatory cytokines and previous studies in alcoholic liver disease showed plasma levels of IL-6 and IL-8 correlated with disease severity. There has been no report regarding plasma levels of IL-6 and Il-8 in Chinese patients with NAFLD.


METHODS
A total of 94 NAFLD patients and 50 age and sex-matched control subjects were enrolled to compare the clinical characteristics and plasma levels of IL-6/IL-8. IL-6 and IL-8 were determined by commercially available enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (R&D systems, USA).


RESULTS
As compared with control group, NAFLD patients had significantly higher BMI (p<0.001), fasting sugar (p=0.002), cholesterol (p=0.017), and triglyceride (p<0.001) level. NAFLD patients with abnormal ALT had the highest plasma levels of IL-6 but it did not reach the statistical differences as compared with other groups. Plasma IL-8 measurement showed NAFLD patients with abnormal serum ALT had the highest level (42.87+/-16.58 pg/mL), followed by NAFLD with normal ALT (13.53+/-2.32 pg/mL) and control groups (9.19+/-1.75 pg/mL, p=0.028 as compared with NAFLD with abnormal ALT).


CONCLUSIONS
Through the chemotactic and proinflammatory effects, IL-8 may play a role in the pathogenesis of NAFLD in Chinese patients.
Chu
Chi-Jen
CJ
Division of Gastroenterology, Department of Medicine Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan 11217, Republic of China. cjchu@vghtpe.gov.tw
Lu
Rei-Hwa
RH
Wang
Sun-Sang
SS
Chang
Full-Young
FY
Lin
Shiang-Yu
SY
Yang
Chin-Yen
CY
Lin
Hsin-Chun
HC
Chang
Chiao-Yu
CY
Wu
Min-Yu
MY
Lee
Shou-Dong
SD
D000328:Adult; D000469:Alkaline Phosphatase / Q000097:blood; D044466:Asian People; D001219:Aspartate Aminotransferases / Q000097:blood; D001786:Blood Glucose / Q000032:analysis; D015992:Body Mass Index; D015897:Comorbidity; D005234:Fatty Liver / Q000097:blood* / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000208:ethnology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D006949:Hyperlipidemias / Q000453:epidemiology; D015850:Interleukin-6 / Q000097:blood*; D016209:Interleukin-8 / Q000097:blood*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged
D001786:Blood Glucose; D015850:Interleukin-6; D016209:Interleukin-8; D001219:Aspartate Aminotransferases; D000469:Alkaline Phosphatase