Cross-sectional study uncovers elevated inflammatory and vascular biomarkers in pediatric sickle cell disease, indicating their potential utility for disease outcome prediction.
Key Points
To identify specific circulating inflammatory, vascular, and neuronal injury biomarkers in pediatric sickle cell disease and evaluate their potential to predict disease outcomes.
Cross-sectional study analyzing clinical data and serum samples from 80 age- and sex-matched children aged 3–8 years selected from a cohort of 377 subjects across diverse hemoglobin genotypes at Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital in Accra, Ghana (2021–2022).
Multiplexed immunoassays were utilized to measure circulating cytokines, chemokines, vascular injury markers, heme scavengers, angiogenic factors, and brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF), evaluated alongside ROC and AUC analyses.
Children with the HbSS genotype exhibited elevated levels of BDNF, Ang-2, CXCL10, CCL11, TNF-α, IL-6, IL-10, IL12p40, ICAM-1, VCAM-1, Tie-2, and VEGFA relative to other hemoglobin genotypes.
Levels of these circulating biomarkers and heme scavengers (HO-1, hemopexin, and haptoglobin) significantly correlated with hemoglobin concentration, leukocyte counts, and erythrocyte counts.
ROC and AUC analyses demonstrated strong discriminatory performance for these biomarker panels in classifying genotypes and predicting clinical outcomes.