Variations of IL-18 levels in patients with acute pancreatitis and its clinical significance

Objective To study changes of serum IL-18 level in patients with acute pancreatitis(AP).Methods Fifty-eight AP patients were selected,and 32 healthy subjects were taken as control group.All AP patients were admitted within 24h after onset,and divied into moderated group(MAP,n=35) and severe group(SAP,n=23) in accordance with Ransons' 11 indicators.Serum IL-18 levels were determined 1,3,7 day after hospitalization in all subjects.Results The serum IL-18 in the MAP and SAP groups were significantly higher than that of the control group(P0.05).Compared to those in the MAP group,IL-18 levels in the SAP group were significantly increased 1,3 days after admission(P0.05),but there were no significant difference on the 7th and 14th day.The Ransons'11 scores of the MAP group on the first day of admissioin was 4.08±1.02 higher than that in the SAP group(2.45±0.76),(P0.05).Serum IL-18 in the AP patients showed a good positive correlation with Ransons'11 scores(r= 0.289,P0.05).Conclusion IL-18 involes in the pathogenesis of AP and relates to severity of AP,so it can be used as a clinical indicator for early diagnosis and severity assessment.