Leptin expression in HIV-infected patients during antiretroviral therapy

• Published in: Germs (Bucureşti) Vol. 5; no. 3; pp. 92 - 98
• Main Authors: Tiliscan, Cătălin, Aramă, Victoria, Mihăilescu, Raluca, Munteanu, Daniela Ioana, Streinu-Cercel, Adrian, Ion, Daniela Adriana, Rădulescu, Mihaela Andreea, Popescu, Cristina, Lobodan, Alina Elena, Negru, Anca Ruxandra, Aramă, Ştefan Sorin
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Romania National Institute of Infectious Diseases “Prof. Dr. Matei Balş”, Romania, and the European Academy of HIV/AIDS and Infectious Diseases 01.09.2015
• Subjects: Original; HIV; Leptin; antiretroviral therapy; HDL-cholesterol
• ISSN: 2248-2997; 2248-2997
• DOI: 10.11599/germs.2015.1076

Leptin is an adipokine with complex metabolic, neuroendocrine and immune functions. Our objective was to evaluate leptin serum levels in a cohort of Romanian HIV-infected patients undergoing antiretroviral therapy in relation to their immune-virological status, lipid and glucose metabolic abnormalities and the presence of metabolic syndrome (MS). We enrolled consecutive non-diabetic HIV-infected patients aged 18 and over on stable cART for at least 6 months. Blood samples were tested for: leptin, CD4 T cells count, HIV viral load and lipid panel. A total of 90 HIV-infected patients were included in the study: 50 males (55.6%) with a mean age of 33.3 years and 40 females with a mean age of 30.4 years. Most patients (74.4%) had HIV viral load below the limit of detection and the median CD4 count for the cohort was 476 (410) cells/cmm. More than one third of the patients (41.1%) had hypoleptinemia. The prevalence of MS was 13.3%. Hypoleptinemia was significantly more frequent in men. In a subset of patients with undetectable HIV viral load, the median leptin value was 0.6 (6.07) ng/mL in patients with poor immune recovery (CD4 count ≤ 200/cmm) compared to 2 (3.07) ng/mL for those with better immune response (CD4 count > 200/cmm), without statistical significance. The median values of leptin were similar for persons with and without MS criteria. HDL-cholesterol values were positively correlated to leptin values in a linear regression model. A significant proportion of patients in our study presented low levels of leptin; this finding was not associated with immune and virological parameters or the presence of MS. Hypoleptinemia was significantly correlated with lower levels of HDL-cholesterol, a key cardiovascular risk factor.