title: Associations of IL-23 with polypoidal choroidal vasculopathy.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To determine the relationship between the levels of intraocular inflammatory cytokines and polypoidal choroidal vasculopathy (PCV).
  
  
  METHODS
  Prospective cohort study. Sixty-two patients with PCV and 36 control subjects were studied. The levels of cytokines, chemokines, and growth factors in the aqueous humor samples from PCV patients and control subjects were assessed for significant associations with PCV. Logistic regression analysis was used to compute the odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) after the study populations were divided into quartiles.
  
  
  RESULTS
  In PCV patients, IL-4, IL-10, and IL-23 were significantly higher than in the controls. Logistic analyses showed a significantly high risk for IL-23 (OR for the highest quartile compared with the lowest quartile: 16.3; 95% CI: 3.5-75.2), VEGF (5.7; 1.2-26.1), and IL-4 (4.0; 1.3-12.7). IL-10 and IL-4, but not IL-23, were significantly correlated with the VEGF levels in PCV patients (IL-10: ρ = 0.477, IL-4: ρ = 0.281). The elevated levels of IL-5, IL-10, IL-4, IL-23, and IL-1α were found to be significantly associated with exudative lesion(s) in the fluorescein angiograms.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The significant associations between elevated levels of IL-23 with PCV and its activity strongly suggest an involvement of inflammatory processes in the etiology of PCV, presumably independent of VEGF. (www.umin.ac.jp/ctr number, UMIN000003854.).
authors.affiliation: Division of Ophthalmology and Visual Science, Faculty of Medicine, Tottori University, Tottori, Japan.
authors.forename: Shin-ichi
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Sasaki
authors.forename: Dai
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Miyazaki
authors.forename: Ken-ichiro
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Miyake
authors.forename: Yuki
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Terasaka
authors.forename: Shuzo
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Kaneda
authors.forename: Yoshifumi
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Ikeda
authors.forename: Taisaku
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Funakoshi
authors.forename: Takashi
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Baba
authors.forename: Atsushi
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Yamasaki
authors.forename: Yoshitsugu
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Inoue
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D015415:Biomarkers / Q000378:metabolism; D002829:Choroid / Q000098:blood supply* / Q000378:metabolism; D020256:Choroidal Neovascularization / Q000378:metabolism* / Q000473:pathology; D004797:Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assay; D005451:Fluorescein Angiography; D005654:Fundus Oculi; D006801:Humans; D053759:Interleukin-23 / Q000378:metabolism*; D011446:Prospective Studies; D012720:Severity of Illness Index
chemical_list: D015415:Biomarkers; D053759:Interleukin-23