IFI27 transcription is an early predictor for COVID-19 outcomes, a multi-cohort observational study.

Purpose: Robust biomarkers that predict disease outcomes amongst COVID-19 patients are necessary for both patient triage and resource prioritisation. Numerous candidate biomarkers have been proposed for COVID-19. However, at present, there is no consensus on the best diagnostic approach to predict outcomes in infected patients. Moreover, it is not clear whether such tools would apply to other potentially pandemic pathogens and therefore of use as stockpile for future pandemic preparedness. Methods: We conducted a multi-cohort observational study to investigate the biology and the prognostic role of interferon alpha-inducible protein 27 (IFI27) in COVID-19 patients. Results: We show that IFI27 is expressed in the respiratory tract of COVID-19 patients and elevated IFI27 expression in the lower respiratory tract is associated with the presence of a high viral load. We further demonstrate that the systemic host response, as measured by blood IFI27 expression, is associated with COVID-19 infection. For clinical outcome prediction (e.g., respiratory failure), IFI27 expression displays a high sensitivity (0.95) and specificity (0.83), outperforming other known predictors of COVID-19 outcomes. Furthermore, IFI27 is upregulated in the blood of infected patients in response to other respiratory viruses. For example, in the pandemic H1N1/09 influenza virus infection, IFI27-like genes were highly upregulated in the blood samples of severely infected patients. Conclusion: These data suggest that prognostic biomarkers targeting the family of IFI27 genes could potentially supplement conventional diagnostic tools in future virus pandemics, independent of whether such pandemics are caused by a coronavirus, an influenza virus or another as yet-to-be discovered respiratory virus.

Levels of Blood Biomarkers among Patients with Myocardial Infarction in Comparison to Control Group.

BACKGROUND: Myocardial infarction (MI) as a term for a heart attack happens due to reduced blood flow to heart myocardium and lack of oxygen supply caused by plaques in the interior walls of coronary arteries. With respect to the importance of MI etiology, we aimed to study the relationship of MI and blood examination variables. METHODS: This study was conducted in Mazandaran Heart Center as a hospital-based case-control Comprising 894 participants including 465 cases and 429 controls, individually matched by sex and age. Considered blood markers were analyzed using routine laboratory methods and equipment. RESULTS: Of all participants, 64.3% of the cases and 51.0% of the controls were males with a mean age of 61.2 (±13.8) in cases and 62.4 (±14.) in controls. We could not find any differences between cases and controls for total cholesterol (TC), low-density lipoprotein (LDL), high-density lipoprotein (HDL), and alkaline-phosphatase (ALP) (P>0.05). However, levels of creatine-kinase-muscle/brain (CK-MB) (P<0.0001), fasting-blood-sugar (FBS) (P<0.0001), aspartate-aminotransferase (AST) (P<0.0001), alanine-transferase (ALT) (P<0.0001) and erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR) (P=0.001) were significantly higher in cases compared to the controls (P<0.05). Multivariable analyses revealed that the risk of MI was associated with high levels of AST (adjusted OR=24.3, 95%CI=3.5±165.6, P=0.001) and LDL (adjusted OR=7.4, 95%CI=1.0±51.8, P=0.001). CONCLUSION: Our investigation indicated that the levels of CK-MB, FBS, AST, ALT and ESR were significantly higher in patients with MI. Besides, our findings showed that the risk of MI in cases with high levels of AST and LDL was about 24 and 7 times more than the control group respectively.