Salivary microflora potential biomarker for pancreatic cancer, chronic pancreatitis
MONDAY, Oct. 17 (HealthDay News) -- Variations in salivary microbiota are associated with pancreatic cancer and chronic pancreatitis, according to a study published online Oct. 12 in Gut.
James J. Farrell, M.D., from the David Geffen School of Medicine at the University of California in Los Angeles, and colleagues assessed variations in salivary microbiota and their correlation with pancreatic cancer and chronic pancreatitis. Salivary microbiota variations were profiled in 10 pancreatic cancer patients and 10 matched controls using the Human Oral Microbe Identification Microarray. Real-time quantitative PCR was used to identify and verify the bacterial candidates which were then validated in a cohort of 28 cases of resectable pancreatic cancer, 27 samples of chronic pancreatitis, and 28 matched healthy controls.
The investigators found that the salivary microbiota differed significantly between pancreatic cancer patients and healthy controls. An increase was seen in 31 bacterial species/clusters and a decrease was seen in 25 species/clusters in patients with pancreatic cancer versus controls. Using the independent samples, Neisseria elongata (N. elongata) and Streptococcus mitis (S. mitis) showed significant variation between pancreatic cancer patients and controls. Significant variation was seen for Granulicatella adiacens and S. mitis between chronic pancreatitis patients and controls. The receiver operating characteristic plot area under the curve had a value of 0.90 with 96.4 percent sensitivity and 82.1 percent specificity for differentiating pancreatic cancer patients from healthy individuals using N. elongata and S. mitis.
"[We] observed associations between variations of patients' salivary microbiota with pancreatic cancer and chronic pancreatitis. This report also provides proof of salivary microbiota as an informative source for discovering non-invasive biomarkers of systemic diseases," the authors write.
One of the study authors disclosed ownership of intellectual property related to the saliva diagnostics field.
Abstract
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