Asymptomatic Survivors of Childhood Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia Demonstrate a Biological Profile of Inflamm-Aging Early in Life

Abstract

Childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) survivors are at higher risk of developing many late effects later in life. They experience multiple health problems that have significant public health implications, such as frailty, premature onset of lifestyle diseases, and second tumors. There is some evidence that chronic inflammation causes accelerated aging in childhood cancer survivors; however, the available data are very limited. The aim of the study was to evaluate the broad panel of cytokines among asymptomatic ALL survivors after anticancer treatment. The study included 56 subjects with a mean age of 16.11 ± 3.98 years. The commercially available Bio-Plex Pro Human Cytokine Screening 48-Plex Panel Assay and Bio-Plex TGF-β Assay were used for simultaneous determination of 48 cytokines and 3 isoforms of TGF-β. Among 51 tested cytokines, the levels of 33 were statistically significantly higher in ALL survivors than in the control group (p p p p p p p p p p p p < 0.05). In conclusion, we found that young asymptomatic survivors after ALL treatment demonstrated a biological profile of complex low-grade chronic inflammation.

Keywords

• aging
• cancer
• CCS
• childhood cancer survivors
• children
• chemokines