TY - JOUR AU - Laurenti, Luca AU - Innocenti, Idanna AU - Benintende, Giulia AU - Tomasso, Annamaria AU - Autore, Francesco AU - Fresa, Alberto AU - Vuono, Florenzia AU - Baroni, Silvia AU - Giannotta, Claudia AU - Chiusolo, Patrizia AU - Sorà, Federica AU - Sica, Simona PY - 2022/01/01 Y2 - 2024/03/28 TI - VEGF and IL-6 correlation in POEMS: a potential upcoming marker of active disease and early autologous BMT response. JF - Mediterranean Journal of Hematology and Infectious Diseases JA - Mediterr J Hematol Infect Dis VL - 14 IS - 1 SE - Scientific Letters DO - 10.4084/mjhid.2022.007 UR - https://www.mjhid.org/mjhid/article/view/4766 SP - e2022007 AB - <p><strong>Introduction:</strong> VEGF function may be responsible for most POEMS manifestations, and it is considered a reliable marker of disease. COVID-19 era arose increasing interest for other inflammatory cytokines, with particular focus on Interleukin-6; VEGF production is stimulated by IL-6 and IL1β, whose concentrations appear to be elevated in clonal plasma cells.</p><p><strong>Objectives:</strong> This study aims to simultaneously evaluate VEGF and IL-6 values in patients (pts) with POEMS at different stages of the disease to find a correlation between them.</p><p><strong>Methods:</strong> We performed a monocentric study, measuring serum levels of VEGF and IL-6 in 8 POEMS pts at different time points of the disease.</p><p><strong>Results:</strong> We observed elevated serum levels of both VEGF and IL-6 in three pts before transplant, while the day after the infusion of autologous stem cells, we observed a steep decrease of both serum markers. Among the four-pts tested only after transplant, two presented with a consensual level of VEGF and IL-6, while the others did not correlate. One patient observed at POEMS diagnosis, during active disease, presented with strikingly high levels of both serum markers.</p><p><strong>Conclusions: </strong>So far, to the best of our knowledge, IL-6 could be considered as a marker of active disease and reliable up to the very first months after BMT, after which its accuracy appears to be lost due to unknown factors, still to be investigated.</p> ER -