Colorectal carcinoma: Evaluation of systemic values of interleukin-1 and interleukin-33 in patients with and without thrombocytosis

Abstract

Background/Aim. Reactive thrombocytosis, as a parane-oplastic syndrome, is often observed in cancer patients. A variety of tumor-related humoral factors and cytokines con-tribute to tumor-stimulated thrombopoiesis. However, the exact role of these cytokines in the pathogenesis of throm-bocytosis remains unclear. The aim of this study was to ana-lyze systemic values of cytokines and clinical-pathological characteristics in colorectal carcinoma (CRC) patients with and without thrombocytosis. Methods. Fifty nine CRC pa-tients were involved in this study and divided into two groups according to the number of platelets. We recorded and analyzed the data about: Age, gender, size of the cancer, localization, metastasis, vascular or lymph vessel invasion, nuclear grade, histological differentiation rate, tumor, no-dus, metastasis (TNM) stage and concentration of cytokines [interleukin (IL)-1, IL-33, IL-12, IL-17 and interferon (IFN)-γ] in both groups. Results. CRC patients with thrombocytosis had significantly higher nuclear grade of the cancer (p = 0.002); higher percentage of detectable metastat-ic lesions in the liver (p = 0.002), lung (p = 0.001), peritoneal carcinomatosis (p = 0.001), detectable invasion of blood (p = 0.012) and lymph vessels (p = 0.010). Concentrations of tumor markers [alpha-fetoprotein (AFP), carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA) and cancer antigen 19-9 (CA19-9)] and se-rum values of IL-1 and IL-33 were significantly higher in CRC patients with thrombocytosis. IL-1/IL-12 (p = 0.016), IL-1/IFN-γ (p = 0.007), IL-1/IL-17 (p = 0.006), IL-33/IL-12 (p = 0.001), IL-33/IFN-γ (p = 0.001), IL-33/IL-17 (p = 0.002), and IL-33/IL-1 (p = 0.006) ratios were significantly higher in CRC patients with thrombocytosis in comparison to CRC patients without thrombocytosis. Analysis of Re-ceiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) curves showed that values of IL-1 [area under curve (AUC) = 0.718; 95% con-fidence interval (CI): 0.567-0.868; sensitivity 69.2%, speci-ficity 62.9%] and IL-33 (AUC = 0.763; 95% CI: 0.614-0.911; sensitivity 84.6%, specificity 65.7%)], could be serve as possible markers for paraneoplastic thrombocytosis in CRC patients. Conclusion. IL-1 and IL-33 significantly correlated to high thrombocyte number in patients with more aggressive CRC.