Clinical and capillaroscopy correlation of Pentraxin 3 and mean platelet volume in patients with systemic sclerosis: A case control study

Systemic sclerosis (SSc) is a systemic connective tissue disease with vasculopathy and tissue fibrosis. Mean platelet volume (MPV) indicates the platelet activation and independent risk factor for arterial diseases. Long pentraxin, or pentraxin-3 (PTX3), is a homologous pattern recognition receptor mainly presented in inflammatory diseases with some inhibitory effects on chronic inflammation. This study aimed to evaluate the relationship between clinical and capillaroscopy manifestations of patients with SSc, MPV, and PTX3 levels compared to the control group. This case-control study was conducted on patients who met the SSc diagnostic criteria. Accordingly, clinical manifestations and capillaroscopy data were recorded. Thus, the MPV and PTX3 levels of the patients and the control group were checked. Then, the relationship between the clinical and capillaroscopy results was evaluated. The mean ± SD of MPV in the control group and patients was 10.11 ± 0.96 fL and 9.65 ± 1.13 fL, respectively (Pvalue = 0.043). In addition, the PTX3 level was 3.60 ± 8.98 and 1.79 ± 5.77 ng/ml, respectively (P-value = 0.223). The relationship of these factors with the clinical and capillaroscopy results was insignificant (P-value > 0.05). Based on the results, the MPV level was significantly lower in patients with SSc than controls, while the PTX3 level did not differ between the groups. Moreover, there was no relationship between PTX3 and MPV levels with the capillaroscopy and clinical results. However, further studies with larger sample sizes are recommended.