Clinical Significance of Thrombosis-Related Markers and Cytokines in Patients with Aortic Aneurysm

Determination was made of serum soluble interleukin-2 receptor (sIL-2R), interleukin-6 (IL-6), and tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-α) levels, and plasma D-dimer, plasmin-α 2 plasmin inhibitor (PIC) and thrombin-antithrombin III complex (TAT) levels in patients with aortic aneurysm for clarification of the functions of cytokines in the pathogenesis of atherosclerosis.Mean sIL-2R and IL-6 values in the patients were 1158.61±778.53 U/ml and 12.80±13.90 pg/ml respectively, these being significantly higher (p<0.01) than in the aged controls (488.22±164.25 U/ml and 3.04±0.21pg/ml). TNF-α was essentially the same in the patients and aged controls. Mean plasma D-dimer, PIC and TAT in the patients were 1197.59±1342.11 ng/ml, 2.34±2.41μg/ml, 25.20±17.08 ng/ml, respectively, significantly exceeding the values for the aged controls (103.71±44.47 ng/ml, 0.72±0.27μg/ml and 2.52±1.21ng/ml respectively).Many more patients (6/6) with higher IL-6 than those (6/11) with lower IL-6 had higher D-dimer (χ2=3.8, p<0.05) and far more patients (9/10) with higher sIL-2R than those (3/8) with lower sIL-2R had higher D-dimer (χ2=5.5, p=0.04).Significant correlation was noted between IL-6 and sIL-2R levels (r=0.76, n=17) in the patients. No correlatinship could be found between TNF-α and IL-6, sIL-2R.It thus follows that sIL-2R and IL-6 in patients should be determined to clarify the pathogenesis of atherosclerosis.