Serum Interleukin-23 Levels in Patients with Ulcerative Colitis

Patients with ulcerative colitis are at increased risk of inflammation.Interleukin 23 (IL-23) is a newly identified cytokine with increased expression ininflamed biopsies of colon mucosa in patients with Crohn's disease; however, there isinconsistent evidence on its role in ulcerative colitis. We aimed to compareserum IL-23 level in patients with ulcerative colitis and normal controls and determineif serum IL-23 level increases with the severity of disease according to endoscopicfindings. We quantified serum IL-23 levels from 60 patients with ulcerativecolitis and 20 control individuals. All patients underwent endoscopic procedure todefine the severity of disease. Patients were then stratified into 2 groups of "Mild" and"Severe" according to the endoscopic findings. For comparison of serum IL-23levels, Platelet count, ESR and CRP between the groups, Mann-Whitney U test andindependent sample t test were employed, as appropriate. Pearson’s and spearmanscorrelation tests were employed to test the association of IL-23 with platelet count, CRPand ESR in patients. Our findings showed that serum IL-23 levels were increased inpatients with ulcerative colitis compared to normal control. Moreover, patients in"Severe" group had higher serum IL-23 levels and ESR compared with those in "Mild"group. There was no significant sexual dimorphism in any of studied variables. We suggest that IL-23 plays an important role in the pathogenesis ofulcerative colitis and is a marker of disease activity in these patients.