Predict the severity of the disease with a new biomarker – healing practice

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COVID-19: New marker could lead to better diagnoses

Many people who are infected with the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus do not even notice this or only develop mild symptoms. Other infected people, on the other hand, become seriously ill with COVID-19. Researchers are now reporting on a new biomarker that could be used to better assess the severity of the disease.

Biomedical scientists from Munich have found a new marker in the blood of people with COVID-19. This provides insights into the course of the disease and could lead to better diagnoses.

Changes in blood clotting

As in a current one Message of the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München (LMU), infections with SARS-CoV-2 run asymptomatic in many patients or hardly cause any symptoms.

However, they can also lead to the disease COVID-19 with changes in blood clotting and inflammation. In addition, doctors observe disorders of the immune system with low lymphocyte titers in the blood in the event of corona infections.

“Up to now, we knew that there was a connection between the components of blood coagulation and the immune reaction,” explains Prof. Dr. Thomas Brocker, who conducts research at the LMU Biomedical Center. “The reasons and the mechanisms were largely unknown,” says the scientist.

Predict the severity with a blood test

In the specialist magazine “Journal of Extracellular Vesicles“Brocker and colleagues now report on the role of phosphatidylserine in COVID-19: a molecule that normally occurs in cell walls.

According to the experts, it could be important for pathophysiological mechanisms relating to the immune system and blood clotting, but it is also suitable as a new biomarker for predicting the severity of the disease using a blood test.

Phosphatidylserine as a signal generator

According to the information, Brocker’s laboratory had previously developed a test that detects phosphatidylserine in or on blood cells. As part of the study, the scientists examined blood samples from 54 people from the LMU’s COVID-19 register (CORKUM) between April 2020 and February 2021.

All of the sick people had COVID-19 in varying degrees of severity. There were also samples from 35 healthy and 12 recovered donors. The focus of the scientific investigation was on mononuclear cells of the peripheral blood such as lymphocytes and monocytes.

All immune cells were analyzed with the phosphatidylserine test and separated by flow cytometry, a physical process. This device took microscopic images of each cell at the same time. Using the image files, the researchers were able to see whether – or where – phosphatidylserine was located. It turned out that the immune cells did not carry the signal inside.

“Lymphocytes from the blood of COVID-19 patients were superficially loaded with fragments of blood platelets, which we were able to demonstrate using the signal,” says Brocker. Platelets, in turn, accelerate blood clotting. “With this, phosphatidylserine could serve as a signal generator for misdirected inflammatory processes or blood clotting disorders in COVID-19, i.e. trigger typical changes in COVID-19,” the LMU scientist assumes.

Established laboratory markers exceeded

The measurements also showed an association between the severity of the COVID-19 disease and phosphatidylserine. As explained in the communication, increased values ​​during the active phase of COVID-19 correlated strongly with the severity of the disease and could lead to better diagnoses in the future.

“As a marker, phosphatidylserine surpassed established laboratory markers for inflammatory processes in the body, for leukocytes and for coagulation factors that are currently used for the clinical evaluation of COVID-19,” says Brocker. Various laboratory parameters are currently used for classification. These are the basis of the WHO scale from zero points (healthy) to eight points (death from COVID-19).

Brocker’s system is still designed for research laboratories; very few clinics have flow cytometers with imaging capabilities. Therefore, the LMU researchers now want to find out whether normal flow cytometers, such as those used in many hospitals in the laboratory, are also suitable for measurement. (ad)