Plasma-soluble urokinase plasminogen activator receptor (suPAR) levels in psoriasis patients and correlation with disease severity

Abstract

Objective: Psoriasis is a chronic, relapsing, inflammatory, hyper-proliferative skin disease. Plasma-soluble urokinase plasminogen activator receptor (suPAR) is released from the cell membrane-bound plasminogen activator and is a new biomarker of systemic inflammation. The aim of this study is to investigate plasma levels in psoriasis patients and determine their correlation with the Psoriasis Area and Severity Index (PASI) score. Materials and methods: The plasma suPAR levels of 50 healthy individuals and 65 psoriasis patients were measured using the Micro-ELISA method and the relation with PASI was investigated. Results: On comparing plasma suPAR levels of the psoriasis patients with the control group consisting of healthy individuals, no statistically significant difference was determined (5.29 ng/ml ± 2.12 and 6.03 ng/ml ± 2.42, respectively, p = 0.326; Table 1). Likewise, there was no significant correlation between the suPAR levels and PASI score (r = 0.147, p = 0.243 > 0.05). Conclusions: There was no statistically significant difference in the plasma SuPAR levels of psoriasis patients compared to the control group. Nevertheless, we firmly believe that plasma SuPAR, a new biomarker, could indicate disease severity if conducted with larger patient series and with moderate to severe psoriasis patients.