Searchable abstracts of presentations at key conferences in endocrinology
Endocrine Abstracts (2009) 20 P614

ECE2009 Poster Presentations Neuroendocrinology, Pituitary and Behaviour (74 abstracts)

Plasma thrombin-activatable fibrinolysis inhibitor antigen levels in acromegalic patients

Mustafa Ozbek 1 , Mehmet Erdogan 2 , Ozcan Ceneli 3 , Hakan Saltas 1 , Erdem Akbal 1 , Mustafa Kizilgun 1 & Kemal Ureten 1


1Ministry of Health, Diskapi Y B Education and Research Hospital, Endocrinology and Metabolism Disease, Ankara, Turkey; 2Department of Endocrinology and Metabolism Disease, Ege University Medical School, Izmir, Turkey; 3Department of Hematology, Kirikkale University School of Medicine, Kirikkale, Turkey.


Objective: Acromegaly is associated with increased morbidity and mortality, mostly due to cardiovascular complications. Thrombin-activatable fibrinolysis inhibitor (TAFI) is associated with coagulation/fibrinolysis and inflammation. Plasma TAFI may participate in arterial thrombosis in cardiovascular diseases (CVD). In this study, we aimed to evaluate the levels of TAFI antigen and also its relationship with other markers in a group of patients with acromegaly in compoarison with healthy controls.

Research design and methods: We studied 29 acromegaly patients and 26 healthy controls. We measured TAFIa/ai antigen in plasma samples with a commercially available ELISA kit.

Results: Routine biochemical parameters, fasting and postprandial glucose levels, BUN, creatinine, CBC, prolactin, TSH, total-cholesterol, LDL cholesterol, triglyceride, homocysteine, and hs-CRP were similar in the two groups (P>0.05), whereas, plasma TAFI antigen levels were significantly elevated in acromegalic patients (154.7±94.0%) when compared with control subjects (107.2±61.6%) (P<0.03). A positive corralation was found by Pearson corralation test between plasma TAFI antigen levels and hs-CRP. (r=0.364, P< 0.01).

Conclusions: In our study, significant alteration in plasma TAFI antigen levels were detected in patients with acromegaly during treatment. Increased TAFI antigen levels in acromegaly should be considered as an important finding in explaining CVD in this disease.

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