The association between interleukin-18 and pulmonary sarcoidosis: a meta-analysis.
OBJECTIVE
To assess the association between interleukin-18 (IL-18) and pulmonary sarcoidosis.


METHODS
The Medline, Embase and Cochrane databases were searched to identify relevant studies. Studies were eligible for inclusion if they enrolled newly-diagnosed, untreated pulmonary sarcoidosis patients with IL-18 measurement in bronchoalveolar lavage fluid (BALF) or blood. A randomized effects model was used to pool six relevant studies.


RESULTS
The IL-18 levels of BALF and blood in patients with pulmonary sarcoidosis were significantly higher than those in control subjects (p = 0.0001, p = 0.04, respectively).


CONCLUSIONS
This meta-analysis has observed some evidence showing that the published results from these studies indicated the statistically significant association between IL-18 and pulmonary sarcoidosis.
Liu
Ding-Hua
DH
Department of Clinical Laboratory, Peking Union Medical College Hospital, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences and Peking Union Medical College, Beijing, China. dinghua_liu@yahoo.cn
Yao
Yun-Tai
YT
Cui
Wei
W
Chen
Ke
K
D015415:Biomarkers / Q000097:blood; D001992:Bronchoalveolar Lavage Fluid / Q000737:chemistry; D016206:Databases, Bibliographic; D016208:Databases, Factual; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D020382:Interleukin-18 / Q000097:blood*; D008297:Male; D017565:Sarcoidosis, Pulmonary / Q000097:blood* / Q000473:pathology
D015415:Biomarkers; D020382:Interleukin-18