title: miRNA expression profiles determined in maternal sera of patients with HELLP syndrome.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Syndrome of hemolysis, elevated liver enzymes and low platelets (HELLP) represents a distinct subgroup of severe preeclampsia. The aim of our study was to identify differentially expressed miRNAs in sera of patients with HELLP syndrome in comparison to unaffected controls.
  
  
  METHODS
  Blood samples were obtained from patients with manifest HELLP syndrome and matched unaffected controls. The expression of 754 mature miRNAs was assessed using the TaqMan Array format (n = 12). Results of seven differentially expressed miRNAs were further validated by single quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) assays.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Serum miRNA analysis allowed detection of maternal and fetal miRNAs. Distinct miRNA expressions were confirmed for miR-122, miR-758 and miR-133a represented by a median up-regulation ≥ two-fold in the HELLP group. The liver specific miR-122 was 11.5-fold increased with an area under curve (AUC) of 0.82 in the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis. Cluster analyses of our data uncovered subgroups of HELLP patients were associated with clinical subtypes and differences in organ manifestation.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  In our proof of principle study, we demonstrated that patients with HELLP syndrome showed alterations of serum miRNA expression patterns. Data analysis goes along with the hypothesis that HELLP syndrome is regarded to be a heterogeneous disease.
authors.affiliation: Department of Gynecology and Obstetrics, University of Rostock , Rostock , Germany.
authors.forename: Johannes
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Stubert
authors.forename: Dirk
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Koczan
authors.forename: Dagmar-Ulrike
authors.initials: DU
authors.lastname: Richter
authors.forename: Max
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Dieterich
authors.forename: Björn
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Ziems
authors.forename: Hans-Jürgen
authors.initials: HJ
authors.lastname: Thiesen
authors.forename: Bernd
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Gerber
authors.forename: Toralf
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Reimer
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D015415:Biomarkers / Q000097:blood; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D005260:Female; D020869:Gene Expression Profiling; D017359:HELLP Syndrome / Q000097:blood*; D006801:Humans; D035683:MicroRNAs / Q000097:blood*; D020411:Oligonucleotide Array Sequence Analysis; D016133:Polymerase Chain Reaction; D011247:Pregnancy; D055815:Young Adult
chemical_list: D015415:Biomarkers; D035683:MicroRNAs