Diagnostic efficacy of GDF-15 in assessing myocardial dysfunction among pan-cancer patients

Abstract Background Cardiotoxicity represents a significant adverse consequence of cancer therapies, yet there remains a paucity of effective biomarkers for its timely monitoring and diagnosis. This study aims to elucidate the role of Growth Differentiation Factor 15 (GDF15) in the context of cancer diagnosis and its specific association with myocardial dysfunction in cancer patients, thereby testing its potential as a predictive marker for cardiotoxicity risk. Methods Analysis of differentially expressed genes (DEGs), including GDF15, was performed by utilizing data from the public repositories of the Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) and the Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO). Examination of GDF15 expression was conducted in various normal and cancerous tissues or sera, using available database and serum samples. The study further explored the correlation between GDF15 expression and the combined detection of cardiac troponin-T (c-TnT) and pro B-type natriuretic peptide (pro-BNP), assessing the combined diagnostic utility of these markers in predicting myocardial diseases in cancer patients through longitudinal electrocardiograms (ECG). Results GDF15 emerged as a significant DEG in both cancer and cardiomyopathy disease models, demonstrating good diagnostic efficacy across multiple cancer types compared to healthy controls. GDF15 levels in cancer patients correlated with the established cardiac biomarkers c-TnT and pro-BNP. Moreover, ECG outcomes indicated that the integrative analysis of these biomarkers significantly enhanced the diagnostic accuracy for myocardial dysfunction in the cancer cohort. Conclusion GDF15 demonstrated promising diagnostic potential in cancer identification, and offers a novel biomarker for the monitoring and diagnosis of cardiotoxicity.