Serum Procollagen Peptides and Collagen Type Vi for the Assessment of Activity and Degree of Hepatic Fibrosis in Schistosomiasis and Alcoholic Liver Disease

Abstract

Schistosomiasis, in contrast to alcoholic liver disease, leads to presinusoidal hepatic fibrosis, which determines the prognosis of the disease. Because conventional liver function tests and liver biopsy specimens provide little information about the dynamics of the fibrotic process, we measured the serum concentrations of procollagen type III N-propeptide and procollagen type I C-propeptide, believed to mainly reflect collagen synthesis, and procollagen type IV C-propeptide and collagen type VI, two presumptive markers of collagen degradation. Determinations were performed in 15 healthy control subjects, 69 patients with various stages of infection with Schistosoma mansoni/Schistosoma haematobium (28 with an early active infection and no organ involvement, 27 with hepatosplenic involvement and 14 with complications of portal hypertension) and 16 patients with alcoholic cirrhosis. In addition, liver biopsy specimens were obtained from 30 schistosomal patients (18 with hepatosplenic involvement and 12 with complications of portal hypertension for histopathological grading and collagen histochemistry. Procollagen type III N-propeptide was significantly elevated in the three patient groups with schistosomiasis when compared with controls (p less than 0.01). Also, patients with higher histological grading showed significantly higher procollagen type III N-propeptide values (p less than 0.05). In alcoholic patients, procollagen type III N-propeptide was even higher and increased parallel to the severity of the disease, determined by using a combined clinical and laboratory index. Procollagen type I C-propeptide was only elevated in early infection (p less than 0.05) and steadily decreased with disease progression.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

Serum hyaluronan and collagen IV as non-invasive markers of liver fibrosis in patients from an endemic area for schistosomiasis mansoni: a field-based study in Brazil

“…Comparing serum C-IV levels between groups, according to the clinical classification of patients with mansonic and hematobic schistosomiasis, Shahin et al (1992) found high serum levels in patients with hepatosplenic schistosomiasis. In Tanzania, a correlation between serum C-IV and clinical and sonographic signs of hepatosplenic schistosomiasis was observed, but it did not have enough sensitivity to be useful as a screening tool for fibrosis (Kardorff et al 1999).…”

High serum laminin and type IV collagen levels in schistosomiasis mansoni

“…Nevertheless, SHAHIN et al (22) suggested that in contrast to alcoholic disease type IV, procollagen was only increased in the late stages of schistosomiasis, thus being a good marker for advanced stages of fibrosis. In this same study the patients were classified into three different forms: a simple clinical form without hepatic involvement compensated hepatosplenic and decompensated hepatosplenic.…”

Simultaneous measurement of collagen type-VI-related antigen and procollagen type-III-N-propeptide levels in bronchoalveolar lavage

“…In chronic hepatitis, cirrhosis and hepatic schistosomiasis, C-VI serum levels were elevated, irrespective of the disease aetiology [20,23]. In all these liver diseases, a histologically proven progress of fibrosis was correlated with an increase in serum PIIINP levels and a relative decrease of serum C-VI levels [19,22,23].…”

“…C-VI was quantified by a newly developed two-armed enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) system [22,23] based on competition of serial dilutions of the standard or the sample with a predetermined amount of rabbit antibodies to human placental C-VI. Uncompeted antibodies were then bound to C-VI immobilized on a 96-well microtitre plate and quantified using biotinylated goat anti-rabbit immunoglobulin G (IgG), followed by rabbit peroxidase antiperoxidase and extravidinperoxidase.…”