The relationship of serum Growth Differentiating factor 15 (GDF15) to hepcidin in post transplant adult Egyptian patients and its prognostic significance

Abstract

Hematopoietic cell transplantation (HCT) is a potentially curative therapeutic approach for a variety of malignant and nonmalignant hematopoietic diseases. When HCT is performed in patients with malignant disorders, preparative or conditioning regimens are administered as part of the procedure to achieve 2 goals: provide sufficient immunoablation to prevent graft rejection and reduce the tumor burden. Hepcidin, a 25-amino acid antimicrobial peptide synthesized in the liver, is encoded by the HAMP gene and considered the central iron-regulatory hormone that mediates the homeostasis of iron concentrations. Growth differentiation factor 15 (GDF-15) is a stress responsive member of the transforming growth factor-B (TGF-B) cytokine superfamily. In health GDF-15 is weakly expressed in human tissues. Under pathological conditions, GDF-15 can be produced by many malignant and nonmalignant condition. Inflammatory cytokines such as tumor necrosis factor α or interleukin 6 (IL‐6) induce the mRNA expression of GDF15 in activated macrophages, which suggests that GDF15 could increase during the inflammatory response. So, GDF-15 has thus been widely explored as a biomarker for disease prognosis.