Circulating levels of adiponectin and leptin at 23-25 weeks of pregnancy in women with impaired placentation and in those with established fetal growth restriction

Makrina D Savvidou (1) , Alexandros Sotiriadis , Christine Kaihura , Kypros H Nicolaides , Naveed Sattar

1 Harris Birthright Research Centre for Fetal Medicine

Adiponectin and leptin, two adipose tissue-derived proteins, have been reported to be elevated in women with established pre-eclampsia (PE). The aim of the current study was to investigate whether alterations of adiponection and leptin levels predate the development of PE and fetal growth restriction (FGR) in women at increased risk of these complications, as assessed by Doppler examination of the uterine arteries during the second trimester of pregnancy. We also sought to investigate the circulating levels of adiponection and leptin in women with established severe, early onset FGR. The study included three groups of pregnant women at 23-25 weeks: Group A (n=44) with normal uterine artery Doppler waveforms, Group B (n=49) with abnormal Doppler waveforms and normal fetal growth at the time of the examination and Group C (n=15) with established, severe FGR and abnormal Doppler. All women had plasma adiponectin and leptin measured by sensitive immunoassays. In Group B, 19 women had normal outcome, 17 delivered FGR infants and 13 developed PE. The women who developed PE delivered smaller babies earlier compared to women with normal outcome (p<0.001). There were no significant differences in adiponectin levels between any of the groups (overall p=0.3). Leptin concentrations, expressed as multiples of the median (MoM) of Group A, were higher in women of Group C i.e established severe FGR at 2.5 (1.2-2.7) MoM's (overall p<0.001) compared to all the other groups and subgroups. In summary, we found that in pregnancies complicated by severe, early onset FGR maternal plasma concentration of leptin is twice as high as in normal pregnancies. However, the second trimester levels of maternal plasma adiponectin and leptin in pregnancies that subsequently develop PE and/or FGR are not significantly different from normal and consequently it is unlikely that these markers will be useful as predictors of these pregnancy complications.

Mots clés: Medicine

Makrina D Savvidou, Alexandros Sotiriadis, Christine Kaihura, Kypros H Nicolaides, Naveed Sattar. Circulating levels of adiponectin and leptin at 23-25 weeks of pregnancy in women with impaired placentation and in those with established fetal growth restriction. Clinical Science, 2008, 115 (7), pp.219-224. ⟨10.1042/CS20070409⟩. ⟨hal-00479415⟩