International Journal of Medical Laboratory
Volume:5 Issue: 4, Nov 2018

Multiple sclerosis (MS) is the most common autoimmune inflammatory demyelinating disease that affects the brain and spinal cord. Dysregulation or mutation of miRNA genes have been linked to the pathogenesis of MS. The miRNAs are short, 20-22 nucleotide long, single-stranded regulatory and non-protein coding RNAs that modulate the expression of multiple target genes. Among miRNAs, miR-223 has been reported to play a critical role in MS. This review concentrates on the emerging role of miR-223 in inflammatory responses and specifically discusses how alterations in miR-223 expression are associated with the development of MS. This review also suggests that miR-223 can be used as a biomarker for diagnosis of MS and discovering novel therapeutics for MS treatment.

ackground and Identification of different allergens is a major challenge in allergic diseases. Avoiding these allergens is known as one of the best types of treatment. The aim of this study is to determine the prevalence of aeroallergens and food allergens in patients with allergy by Skin Prick Test. A cross-sectional study was conducted on 255 patients with allergic diseases who had referred to the Khorshid Allergy and Immunology Clinic. Skin Prick Test was performed using 82 allergen extracts to determine the patients' sensitivity to food and aeroallergens. One hundred percent of the patients were sensitive to at least one allergen. Allergy to food allergens and aeroallergens was 49% and 51 %, respectively. Most sensitivity to food allergens included hazelnut (26.27%), bananas (21.96%), egg yolk (21.56%) and wheat (20.39%). Among the aeroallergens, grass with a frequency of 87% and fungi with a frequency of 34% had the highest and lowest frequencies. Depending on the nutrition, cultural habits, environmental conditions, and life style, prevalence of the allergens in each area may be different. Therefore, early identification and avoidance from these allergens can be suggested.

The prevalence of latent autoimmune diabetes
in adults (LADA) among diabetic patients is less recognized and underdiagnosed. The aim of this study was to determine the prevalence of LADA in type 2 diabetic patients and to compare the characteristics of these two groups in Torbat-e Heydarieh, Iran. Totally, 198 male and 277 female patients diagnosed with type 2 diabetes are aged between 35 -70 years were selected and the glutamic acid decarboxylase antibodies (GADA) assessment was used for the diagnosis of LADA in them. GADA in their sera was measured by commercial anti-GAD enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) kit. In addition, blood pressure, sera C-peptide and cholesterol levels was measured and compared in the mentioned two groups. Demographic data including age, gender, age at diagnosis, family history of diabetes, body mass index and need for insulin therapy were collected from subjects and data were analyzed using SPSS software. Of 475 patients, 53 ones (11.2%) were GADA positive. Significant difference was found between GADA positive and GADA negative patients in terms of mean age, C-peptide levels, cholesterol levels and need for insulin therapy to control the disease. As for gender, family history of diabetes, body mass index value and hypertension there was no significant correlation between these two groups. The prevalence of LADA in diabetic patients was 11.2%. Presence of GAD antibodies in diabetic patients is related to reduced levels of C-peptide, increased cholesterol levels and the need for insulin during the follow-up.

Ficolins are proteins that bind to carbohydrates, act as opsonins and play an important role in innate immunity. Polymorphism in ficolin-3 gene (FCN3) can lead to complement deficiency and increase the risk of some disorders such as diabetes. The aim of this study was to investigate the frequency of FCN3+1637delC as a single nucleotide polymorphism in this gene in healthy and diabetic subjects of Iran. Blood was taken from 36 diabetics and 37 healthy subjects who had referred to the Iranian Blood Transfusion Organization. Blood sugar was analyzed using a calorimetric method. After DNA extraction using salting out method, polymerase chain reaction (PCR) was carried out and the restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) method was accomplished using ApaI restriction enzyme. Consequently, the resulted fragments were evaluated using electrophoresis on 2% L-agarose gel. Evaluation of the results indicated that the heterozygote form of single-nucleotide polymorphism FCN3+1637delC was seen in three samples (8.1%) of the studied healthy subjects and in two samples (5.6%) of the diabetic individuals. Besides, the homozygous form of the mutation was not seen in the studied healthy and diabetic subjects. Results of this study showed that FCN3 variant of single-nucleotide polymorphism FCN3+1637delC was not considered as a risk factor for type 2 diabetes mellitus in Iranian subjects.

Uropathogenic E.coli is one of the most known causes of urinary tract infections, which may lead to a high rate of morbidity and mortality in high risk patients. In this regard, the virulence factors such as bacterial adhesion molecules have a critical role. The current study was intended to determine the molecular properties of adhesion genes in Uropathogenic E.coli strains isolated from hospitalized patients in Babol, north of Iran. During a nine-months of study, 90 Uropathogenic E.coli strains were confirmed by differential biochemical and microbiological standard tests, antimicrobial susceptibility test, and molecular polymerase chain reaction assay were obtained for evaluating the frequency of adhesion genes. According to the results, the highest rate of resistance and susceptibility were belonged to penicillin and imipenem respectively. On the other hand, the percentage of fimH gene among other virulence genes was reported to be 66%. The present study showed that a high level of uropathogenic E.coli isolates which harbored the adhesion factors may lead to distribution of multiple antimicrobial resistance strains.

Acinetobacter baumannii (A. baumannii) is an important multidrug-resistant opportunistic pathogen frequently causing various nosocomial infections and is a serious threat to burn patients. These infections are usually caused by the outbreak strains. The aim of this study was to show antibiotic resistance pattern and molecular typing of A. baumannii genes isolates collected from burn patients and also distribution of different types of burn patients. In this study, 307 different strains were detected. Totally 100 A. baumannii strain was selected in burn center of Isfahan hospital. Antibiotic resistance pattern was determined by disk diffusion method (Kirby Bauer). The presence of genes coding in antibiotic resistance were analyzed by using multiplex-PCR method. The standard strains of Escherichia coli ATCC 25922 and A. baumannii ATCC 19606 were used as negative and positive controls. The antibiotic resistance pattern for A. baumannii showed high resistance for ciprofloxacin, ceftazidime, and tetracycline with frequency of 82.5%, 75.3%, 72%, respectively. Moreover, the most sensitive antibiotics were chloramphenicol, and nitrofurantoin with the resistance frequency of 3.9% and 2.8%. CITM (91.1%) was the highest detected gene. High prevalence of antibiotic resistance pattern among A. baumannii isolated from burn center hospitals indicates the important role of multidrug resistant isolates.

Thalassemia is one the most prevalent genetic anemia in the world; homozygote patients usually suffer from severe disturbances. Osteopenia and osteoporosis are of various types of thalassemia complications which increase in rate in patients with iron overload conditions. Sclerostin is a protein which enhances bone loss by inhibiting osteoblasts. The aim of this study was to measure sclerostin protein and its association with iron overload in major thalassemia patients. Forty patients with major beta-Thalassemia and 40 healthy control individuals were includedin the study; Sclerostin protein and ferritin were evaluated using enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay method. Mean sclerostin protein was 100.7 pg/ml, in the case group; it was 143.1 pg/ml in the control group.There was a significant differences between sclerostin protein in case and control groups (p= 0.01). The association of sclerostin and ferritin was not significant in the case group (p= 0.7), while  it was meaningful in the control individuals (p= 0.04). Our findings suggest that sclerostin protein can play an important role in the pathogenesis of osteoporosis.

The aim was to determine the role of dominant serovars of Listeria monocytogenes (L. monocytogenes) in spontaneous abortions, using isolation methods and polymerase change reaction (PCR). A total of 258 samples comprising of placental tissue, vaginal swabs and blood were collected from 123 patients with spontaneous abortion. L. monocytogenes was identified and confirmed by culture, biochemical reactions, serological tests, API system, CAMP (Christie, Atkins, Munch and Petersen) test, and hemolysis on sheep blood agar. Phosphatidyl inositol specific phospholipase C (PI-PLC) assay, followed by multiplex PCR was applied for detection of serotypes 1/2a and 4b. Out of 258 samples, 28 isolates of L. monocytogenes were identified   by different methods. All of the isolates were confirmed by PCR. Of 28 isolated strains, 14(50%) belonged to serovar 1/2a, 10(35.7%) to serovar 4b and 4(14.3%) to other serovars. Based on our study, serovars 1/2a and 4b are dominant serovars as causative agents of human spontaneous abortion due to L. monocytogenes in pregnant women.