Adipose tissue-derived factors as potential biomarkers in cachectic cancer patients

AbstractCachexia, a paraneoplastic syndrome markedly associated with worsened prognosis in cancer patients, provokes profound wasting of both lean and adipose mass in an association with a state of metabolic “chaos”. The white adipose tissue responds to cachexia with marked local inflammation and may be thus a relevant contributor to systemic inflammation. To address this hypothesis we examined the correlation between tissue expression of adipokines and plasma concentration in cachectic and stable weight patients with or without cancer. Adiponectin and liver-derived CRP concentration were significantly higher in the cachectic groups when compared with stable weight patients (P<0.01). The concentration of plasma IL-6 was higher (11.4-fold) in the cancer cachectic group when compared with weight-stable controls, and presented a significant correlation with the presence of cancer (P