Expression Study of Candidate miRNAs And Evaluation of their Potential use as Biomarkers of Diabetic Neuropathy

Abstract

Aim: To evaluate the expression of candidate miRNAs in relation to diabetic polyneuropathy (DPN) and cardiovascular autonomic neuropathy (CAN). Materials & methods: The expression of six candidate miRNAs has been evaluated in 49 Type 2 diabetes patients with neurological evaluation. Results: A higher expression of miR-128a was seen in patients with DPN compared with those without DPN (p = 0.015). miR-155 and miR-499a seemed to be down-expressed in patients with DPN (p = 0.04 and p = 0.05, respectively). A lower expression of miR-155 (p = 0.05) was observed even in patients with CAN with respect to CAN-negative. A higher expression of miR-155 was associated with the rs767649 polymorphism variant allele compared with the wild-type allele (p = 0.03). Conclusion: miR-128a, miR-155 and miR-499a might be involved in diabetic neuropathies development.

Keywords::

• diabetic neuropathy
• expression study
• microRNAs

Supplementary data

To view the supplementary data that accompany this paper please visit the journal website at: www.tandfonline.com/doi/suppl/10.2217/epi-2019-0242

Financial & competing interests disclosure

This research has been supported by the 2017 FFABR funding for research activities of Italian National Agency for the Evaluation of the University and Research Systems (ANVUR). The authors have no other relevant affiliations or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript apart from those disclosed.

No writing assistance was utilized in the production of this manuscript.

Ethical conduct of research

The study was approved by Ethics Committee of the Tor Vergata University Hospital. All participants provided written informed consent.

Additional information

Funding

This research has been supported by the 2017 FFABR funding for research activities of Italian National Agency for the Evaluation of the University and Research Systems (ANVUR). The authors have no other relevant affiliations or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript apart from those disclosed. No writing assistance was utilized in the production of this manuscript.