Potential Utility of Plasma Fatty Acid Analysis in the Diagnosis of Cystic Fibrosis

Background: An altered distribution of fatty acids in cells and tissues is found in patients with cystic fibrosis (CF). In this study, we assessed the potential role of plasma fatty acid analysis in the diagnosis of CF. Methods: In this 2-part study, we first used gas chroma-tography–mass spectrometry to analyze fatty acids in plasma from 13 CF patients and 11 controls without CF. We then used the fatty acid distribution data to identify the fatty acids or multiple fatty-acid calculations most effective in identifying CF patients. Part 2 of the study was a blinded analysis of 10 CF patients and 9 controls to directly test the effectiveness of the diagnostic param-eters for CF identified from the plasma fatty acid analysis. Results: In the nonblinded trial, the multiplicatio