London 8 August : Researchers have discovered an elevated blood protein that levels could increase the chances of becoming diabetic and even death from cancer. Prostasin acts as a stimulator of epithelial sodium channels which regulate the balance of sodium blood volume, blood volume, and blood pressure.
It has been proven to inhibit tumor growth caused by high blood sugar and is related with the metabolism of glucose.
The research findings are presented in Diabetologia, showed that people with prostasin had 76 percent more likely to get diabetes.
Prostasin levels have also been discovered to be an excellent indicator of the development of diabetes in younger people, and people with lower blood sugar levels and better kidney function.
Researchers also discovered that prostasin was related with both cancer mortality as well as all-cause mortality.
People with blood levels of prostasin were 43 percent higher likely to die from cancer.
For every double of prostasin levels, the risk of cancer mortality rose by 139 percent and 24 per cent respectively, in those with and without high levels of blood glucose (impaired fasting glucose).
No correlation was observed for mortality from cardiovascular causes.
“Prostasin could be a simple indicator of disease or be causally relevant this is exciting because it opens up the possibility of targeting this protein with future treatments for cancer and diabetes,” said Professor Gunnar Engstrom of Lund University in Malmo, Sweden.
“Prostasin is a potential risk factor for the development of diabetes and cancer mortality, specifically in people with excessive blood glucose levels” explained Dr Xue Bao of The Affiliated Hospital of Nanjing University Medical School in Nanjing, China.
“It is easy to access and has the potential to act as a warning signal in the near future.”
The study examined blood samples from more than 4000 middle-aged Swedish adults, who were collected about a decade time ago.
After adjusting for possible confounding factors such as age, sex and waist circumference smoking and drinking habits LDL-cholesterol and systolic blood-pressure and antihypertensive medication increased prostasin levels.These were discovered to be connected with the presence of diabetes, with those in the most high prostasin quartile nearly twice as likely suffer from diabetes as those in the lower.
Over an average 22-year follow-up, 702 participants developed diabetes.
Over a typical monitoring of 24 years, 651 patients died due to cancer.
Researchers say that the findings are merely observational and could require further research.
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