Investigation of Changes in Aspartate Aminotransferase and Alanine Aminotransferase in Serum and Saliva of Patients with Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD)

Abstract

Background and purpose: Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) is a chronic, recurrent, and autoimmune disease of the digestive system with intra- and extra-intestinal manifestations. IBD is divided into Crohn's disease (CD) and ulcerative colitis (UC). The prevalence exceeds 3 million people per year and is reported more frequently in industrialized countries than in developing ones. IBD is a lifelong disease that affects the quality of life of sufferers and also increases the risk of colon cancer due to chronic inflammation. Today, the diagnosis and follow-up of this disease is based on history, imaging of the gastrointestinal tract, and pathology findings, which is expensive and has the risk of damage to the gastrointestinal tract, for this reason, the use of new methods has attracted the attention of researchers. Saliva is easy to use, cheap, has no risk of infection, and is always available. The changes of some parameters in the serum and saliva of IBD patients have been investigated, but no study has been done on aspartate aminotransferase (AST) and alanine aminotransferase (ALT). Studies have shown that AST and ALT can be used as a marker for cell damage and inflammation. This study aimed to investigate the salivary and serum changes of these two markers in patients with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). Materials and methods: This cross-sectional study was conducted in 1402 in the gastroenterology clinic of Imam Reza Hospital in Tehran. 30 people with IBD with a definitive diagnosis by pathology as the patient group and 30 healthy people who visited the hospital for an annual checkup participated in the study as the control group. First, the patients were asked to wash their mouths and swallow the remaining liquid, and without actively moving the mouth and tongue, pour the secreted saliva into the sterile falcon tube. Then, by a skilled person, 5 ml of venous blood was taken from the cubital area of the patient and put into the clot tube. Immediately after collection, the samples were centrifuged at 4000 rpm for 5 minutes. Blood serum and non-stimulating saliva supernatant were transferred into a microtube and stored in a freezer at -70 degrees Celsius. Enzyme activity was measured using the photometric method according to the manufacturer's instructions (Pars Azmon-Shiraz) and the data was analyzed by t-test with SPSS version 22 software. Results: 30 patients with IBD (17 men and 13 women) with an average age of 37.7±2.3 years and 30 healthy subjects (16 men and 14 women) with an average age of 32.5±2.2 years were included in the study. (P<0.05). Data analysis showed that in the patient group, the serum level of AST and ALT in the patient and healthy groups was not significantly different. However, salivary AST level, unlike ALT level, increases significantly in patients. Conclusion: According to the results of this study, the salivary activity of aspartate aminotransferase (AST) appears to be increased in patients with IBD.

Keywords

• inflammatory bowel disease
• saliva
• serum
• aspartate aminotransferase
• alanine aminotransferase