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Updated: Oct 19, 2026
Monochrome Multiplex Quantitative PCR Telomere Length Measurement
Published on: March 22, 2024
Association between Telomere Length and Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis: A Case-Control Study
Alireza Eslaminejad1, Jalal Heshmatnia1, Seyed Alireza Nadji2
1Chronic Respiratory Diseases Research Center, National Research Institute of Tuberculosis and Lung diseases (NRITLD), Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.
Background:
Given the poor survival of patients with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF), it is necessary to investigate the effect of telomere length on this disease and on treatments that improve it; therefore, the purpose of the present study was to investigate the relationship between telomere length and IPF.
Materials And Methods:
In our case-control study, 144 participants, including 72 IPF patients admitted to Masih Daneshvari Hospital and 72 healthy controls, were selected. Blood tests were done for all subjects. Telomere length was measured using quantitative real-time PCR. The results were analyzed using SPSS version 22 software.
Results:
The mean telomere length in the IPF group was 0.94±0.06, which was significantly lower than that of the control group (0.97±0.03) (P<0.001). Also, there was no significant correlation between telomere length with 6-minute walk test (6MWT) (r=-0.126, P=0.296), saturated oxygen (SpO2) (r=-0.204, P=0.088), transfer factor of the lung for carbon monoxide (TLCO) (r=-0.049, P=0.687), total lung capacity (TLC) (r=-0.028, P=0.819), FEV1/FVC (r=-0.018, P=0.884), forced vital capacity (FVC) (r=0.022, P=0.858), body mass index (BMI) (r=0.014, P=0.908), and forced expiratory volume in 1 second (FEV1) (r=0.096, P=0.425).
Conclusion:
The results of the present study showed that IPF is an accelerated-aging disease because the telomere length index, which reflects oxidative damage, cellular turnover, and aging, is significantly reduced in these patients compared with healthy individuals of the same age.
