May endocan be a new biomarker in the diagnosis of endometriosis?
Gamze Nur Cimilli Senocak1, Omer Erkan Yapca1, Emsal Pınar Topdagi Yılmaz1
1Ataturk University, Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Erzurum, Turkey.
Aim:
As known, inflammatory substances are considered to have a role in the onset and progression of endometriosis. In this study, we aimed to find a biomarker that can be used in the diagnosis of endometriosis by investigating the serum levels of endocan, which is a substance that we know to have an important role in angiogenesis and inflammation, in patients with endometriosis.
Study Design:
45 patients between the ages of 18-40 with the diagnosis of stage 3-4 endometriosis and whose postoperative histopathological tissue diagnoses were endometriosis were included in the study as study group. As the control group, a total of 45 healthy women between the ages of 18-40 were included in the study. The two groups were statistically compared.
Results:
There was no statistically significant difference between the two groups in terms of age, BMI, LH, E2, and mean Hb values. It was observed in the examination of the endocan levels that the mean values in the study (endometriosis, patient group) group were statistically and significantly higher compared to the control (healthy) group (p:0.000). Also, mean FSH and Ca125 levels were determined to be statistically and significantly higher in the endometriosis group (p:0.042 and p:0.000).
Conclusion:
In this study, we found a statistically significant correlation between the levels of serum endocan and endometriosis. As the results, endocan can be used as a new biomarker to diagnose patients with endometriosis or in their follow up period. Much more comprehensive future studies are needed on this subject.
