Endocrine Abstracts

Introduction: Autism is a neurodevelopmental disorder with a pathogenesis that is not completely understood. Although a genetic origin has been recognized, a potential role for environmental factors, immune dysfunctions, and variations of hormonal levels was suggested. Ghrelin is a peptide hormone which can stimulate growth hormone (GH) release by activating GH secretagogue receptor. In addition, ghrelin exerts neuroprotective effects, inhibits apoptosis in hypothalamic neurons and has positive effects on learning and memory.

Design: A case-control study was employed to investigate acylated ghrelin (AG), des-acyl ghrelin (DAG), leptin and growth hormone (GH) levels in Saudi autistic children.

Methods: We investigated AG, DAG, leptin and GH in 31 Saudi autistic male patients in comparison to those levels in 28 healthy age-matched children. Hormones were measured in blood samples using commercially available ELISA kits. Independent t-test was used to investigate statistical significance in study groups with a (p) value of less than 0.05 was considered significant.

Results: In autistic group AG, DAG and GH levels were significantly lower compared to the control group by 31.6, 28.4, and 47.9%, respectively. Leptin concentration was significantly higher by 106.2% in autistic children. While leptin levels showed positive correlation (r=+0.57) with body mass index (BMI) in autistic group, DAG levels had no significant correlation with BMI in the same group.

Conclusion: Our results demonstrate a novel decrease of AG, DAG and GH levels in autistic children in comparison with age-matched control group. Considering ghrelin’s capacity to affect neuroinflammatory and apoptotic processes that were shown to be linked to autism, this study indicates a potential role for ghrelin in the pathogenesis of autism and further studies are needed to elucidate the role of ghrelin as a diagnostic biomarker and a potential therapeutic agent in autism.

Declaration of interest: The authors declare that there is no conflict of interest that could be perceived as prejudicing the impartiality of the research project.

Funding: This work was supported however funding details unavailable.