New test for early diagnosis of osteoarthritis

Washington April 23 (ANI): Scientists have identified novel ways of measuring biological markers in the blood, which could be used to diagnose osteoarthritis earlier.

The new biochemical test called metabolomics allows the scientists to test for 163 chemical signals at the same time from a single blood sample.

These chemical signals are intermediate products of the metabolism of human cells and their 26,000 metabolite ratios represent the rate of the chemical reactions in the human body.

Researchers at King's College London's Department of Twin Research and Genetic Epidemiology, based at St Thomas' Hospital first studied 123 white women with osteoarthritis of the knee and 299 healthy women from the Twins UK register, comparing the difference in the metabolites and the 26,000 metabolite ratios between the two groups.

They found that 14 metabolite ratios were significantly associated with osteoarthritis. The team then tested these signals to see if they were replicated in an independent sample consisting of 76 women with knee arthritis and 100 healthy women.

Two ratios - valine to histidine and xleucine to histidine - were successfully confirmed in the replication sample.

"The search for biomarkers, or traits, which can be used to measure or indicate the effects or progress of a condition is a hugely exciting area of clinical research. The two novel metabolic biomarkers found through our study could indicate increased cartilage breakdown and we now want to study these mechanisms in more detail," Dr Guangju Zhai, lead author on the paper, said.

Professor Tim Spector, senior author of the paper added: "Ours is the first study using a metabolomics approach to identify novel metabolic biomarkers for osteoarthritis."

The research has been published in the journal, Annals of Rheumatic Diseases. (ANI)