MicroRNAs in exhaled breath condensate and plasma for diagnosis of asbestos-related interstitial lung diseases

BACKGROUND: MicroRNAs (miRNAs) have been proposed as diagnostic biomarkers of asbestos-related cancers, but their role in asbestos-related interstitial lung diseases (ILDs) is unknown. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS: We conducted a pilot study in 30 subjects: 11 unexposed population controls, 8 ILD-free asbestos-exposed subjects, and 11 asbestos-related ILD cases. We used the Receiver Operator Characteristic (ROC) Area Under the Curve (AUC) to estimate the diagnostic accuracy of miRNAs, and volcano plots to assess their differential expression between the study groups. RESULTS: miR-548h-5p was over-expressed in ILD-free asbestos-exposed subjects and demonstrated a 90% accuracy (95% CI: 0.75-1.00) in discriminating them from unexposed subjects, as well as a 96% diagnostic accuracy (95% CI: 0.88-1.00) in differentiating asbestos-related ILD cases from ILD-free asbestos-exposed subjects. miR-6127-3p was over-expressed and showed an accuracy of 85% (95% CI: 0.66-1.00) in discriminating asbestos-related ILD cases from unexposed subjects in plasma. let-7f-5p was over-expressed in the exhaled breath condensate (EBC) of ILD-free asbestos-exposed subjects and showed a 90% accuracy (95% CI: 0.76-1.00) in discriminating them from unexposed subjects. CONCLUSIONS: Our results suggest that the plasma and EBC miRNA profile might serve as a diagnostic biomarker of asbestos-related ILDs.