Clinical significance of chitotriosidase in outpatients with advanced heart failure

Abstract

The previous studies have shown that plasma chitotriosidase (CHIT) levels increase in many diseases with inflammation. However, there are no reported studies investigating the relationship between CHIT and chronic heart failure (CHF) which is an inflammatory process. Therefore, we aimed to investigate the role of CHIT in diagnosis and severity of CHF in this study. 36 patients (50% male, mean age 63.17±10.18 years) with left ventricular ejection fraction <40% and 27 controls (44% male, mean age 61.33±8.73 years) were included in this study. Patients with CHF were divided into two groups as ischemic heart failure (IHF) and non-ischemic heart failure (NIHF) according to the underlying etiology. Plasma CHIT and N-terminal pro brain natriuretic peptide (NT-proBNP) levels were measured by ELISA method. Plasma CHIT and NT-proBNP levels were higher in patients with CHF than in controls (CHIT 931.25±461.39 ng/mL, 232.79±61.28 ng/mL, p<0.001; NT-proBNP, 595.31±428.11 pg/mL vs 78.13±30.47 pg/L; p<0.001). Also, the levels of these parameters increased in IHF compared with NIHF (CHIT, 1139.28±495.22 ng/mL, 671.22±237.21 ng/mL, p=0.002; NT-proBNP, 792.87±461.26 pg/mL vs 348.36±202.61 pg/mL, p=0.001) and there was a strong correlation between NT-proBNP and CHIT (r=0.969, p<0.001). According to this study findings, plasma CHIT level increases in CHF and its increased levels are correlated with NT-proBNP which is used diagnosis and prognosis of HF.