title: Plasma-soluble urokinase plasminogen activator receptor (suPAR) levels in psoriasis patients and correlation with disease severity.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Psoriasis is a chronic, relapsing, inflammatory, hyper-proliferative skin disease. Plasma-soluble urokinase plasminogen activator receptor (suPAR) is released from the cell membrane-bound plasminogen activator and is a new biomarker of systemic inflammation. The aim of this study is to investigate plasma levels in psoriasis patients and determine their correlation with the Psoriasis Area and Severity Index (PASI) score.
  
  
  METHODS
  The plasma suPAR levels of 50 healthy individuals and 65 psoriasis patients were measured using the Micro-ELISA method and the relation with PASI was investigated.
  
  
  RESULTS
  On comparing plasma suPAR levels of the psoriasis patients with the control group consisting of healthy individuals, no statistically significant difference was determined (5.29 ng/ml ± 2.12 and 6.03 ng/ml ± 2.42, respectively, p = 0.326; Table 1). Likewise, there was no significant correlation between the suPAR levels and PASI score (r = 0.147, p = 0.243 > 0.05).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  There was no statistically significant difference in the plasma SuPAR levels of psoriasis patients compared to the control group. Nevertheless, we firmly believe that plasma SuPAR, a new biomarker, could indicate disease severity if conducted with larger patient series and with moderate to severe psoriasis patients.
authors.affiliation: Department of Dermatology, Konya Training and Research Hospital, Konya, Turkey. Corresponding author: gsaylamkurtipek@yahoo.com.
authors.forename: Gülcan Saylam
authors.initials: GS
authors.lastname: Kurtipek
authors.affiliation: Department of Microbiology, Faculty of Medicine, Afyonkarahisar University, Afyonkarahisar, Afyonkarahisar, Turkey.
authors.forename: Recep
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Kesli
authors.affiliation: Department of Dermatology, Faculty of Medicine, Selçuk University, Konya, Turkey.
authors.forename: Fatma
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Tunçez Akyürek
authors.affiliation: Department of Biochemistry, Faculty of Medicine, Selçuk University, Konya, Turkey.
authors.forename: Fikret
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Akyüret
authors.affiliation: Department of Biochemistry, Faculty of Medicine, Selçuk University, Konya, Turkey.
authors.forename: Yüksel
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Terzi
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D015415:Biomarkers / Q000097:blood; D004797:Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assay; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011565:Psoriasis / Q000097:blood*; D055293:Receptors, Urokinase Plasminogen Activator / Q000097:blood*; D012720:Severity of Illness Index; D055815:Young Adult
chemical_list: D015415:Biomarkers; C524898:PLAUR protein, human; D055293:Receptors, Urokinase Plasminogen Activator