Analysis Of Serum Clusterin Level In Patients With Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis

Objective:Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis(ALS)is a chronic fatal neurodegenerative diseases.The highly heterogeneous phenotype of ALS,coupled with the lack of reliable biomarkers,leads to delayed diagnosis.The delayed diagnosis limits the early neuroprotective therapy.Therefore,it is necessary to search for reliable biomarkers and shorten the delay in the diagnosis for ALS.More studies have shown that ALS has abnormal lipid metabolism.During the previous study of cholesterol metabolism in our laboratory,we found that the clusterin mRNA in the spinal cord of SOD1~G93A93A mice increased in the early stage of symptoms(about 120 days)using RT-PCR.Clusterin in ALS patients were also increased using mass spectrometry.However,the above experimental methods were complicated,expensive and difficult to be widely applied in clinical practice.Therefore,in this study,we use enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay(ELISA)to measure the serum clusterin level in ALS patients and healthy controls and explore the feasibility that clusterin be a new biomarker.Methods:There were 62 ALS patients who were admitted from Jul.2014to Sep.2018 in the department of neurology,the second hospital of Hebei Medical University and 65 health controls with ages and sex matched with ALS in the physical examination center in the second hospital of Hebei Medical University.All subjects'fasting blood were centrifuged.The upper serum were stored in EP tubes and stored in ultra-low temperature refrigerator(-80?)until required for analysis.Two groups of serum samples were assayed using human CLU(clusterin)ELISA kit.The OD value was measured using a microplate reader at 450 nm,and calculate the concentration of CLU in the samples.SPSS21.0 was used for statistical analysis.Results:The serum clusterin level in ALS patients were 2674.52±1035.33ug/ml.The healthy controls were(2268.68±1136.80 ug/ml),P=0.038.The different subgroups of different diagnostic grades,sex,ages and course analysis of ALS showed there were no statistically significant differrece(P>0.05).Conclusion:The serum clusterin level in ALS patients were significantly higher compared to healthy controls.Clusterin is expected to be a new biomarker for ALS.