Background/aims: The primary objective of this study is to evaluate the diagnosis effect of serum protein factors and microRNAs for children suffering from viral myocarditis (VMC).
Methods: The expression levels of serum cardiac troponin I (cTnI), interleukin-18 (IL-18) and tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-α) in both VMC and control groups were examined by using the Elisa Kit. The expression levels of miR-1 and miR-146b were measured through RT-PCR. Subsequently, the Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) curves were drawn based on the diagnostic results of VMC. Moreover, the Spearman correlation analysis was carried out to unveil the association between the indicator expression levels and the ultrasonic cardiogram results, including the left ventricular fractional shortening (FS) and left ventricular ejection fraction (EF).
Results: It is found that the expression levels between the VMC and control group portrait significant differences with respect to cTnI, IL-18, TNF-α, miR-1 and mIR-146b (P < 0.05). The diagnostic thresholds for cTnI, IL-18, TNF-α were 160.00 ng/L, 2.26 ng/L and 1.14ng/L, respectively. The diagnostic thresholds for miR-1 and miR-146b were 0.75 and 1.27, respectively. Results from the Spearman correlation analysis showed that levels of the miR-1 were negatively correlated with FS and EF, while levels of the cTnI, IL-18, TNF-α and miR-146b were positively correlated with FS and EF.
Conclusions: The expression levels of the TNF-α, IL-18 and cTnI and the expression levels of the miR-1 and miR-146b could be used to predict VMC among children and this approach may reinforce the diagnosis of VMC in clinical practices.
© 2016 The Author(s) Published by S. Karger AG, Basel.