| Presentation preference | Oral presentation |
| Title | Specific MicroRNAs as Biomarkers for Uveitis in Juvenile Idiopathic Arthritis |
| Purpose | Juvenile idiopathic arthritis-associated uveitis (JIA-U) is a silent vision-robing disease. Favorable visual outcome depends largely upon early diagnosis and aggressive treatment to control inflammation. This study was aimed to investigate specific microRNA's (miRNA) expression in JIA-U compared to JIA without uveitis as well as active versus non-active disease and explore a possible role as predictive biomarkers of the disease. |
| Methods | miRNA expression profiling was performed on peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) of 44 pediatric patients: twenty-two patients with JIA-U (15 with non-active and 7 with active ocular disease), ten with JIA only, and twelve patients with other type of uveitis as a control group (6 with non-active and 6 with active ocular disease). Nanostring panels and high-throughput small-RNASeq were used for subsets of samples and analyzed accordingly. |
| Results | Significant differential expression was found for several miRNAs in JIA with and without uveitis (all following FDR<0.05). miR-204-3p and miR-6124 increased in the JIA-U groups (active and non-active) vs. control. Conversely, miR-579-3p and miR-3912-5p were decreased for JIA-U patients vs. controls. Also noteworthy, miR-493-3p and hsa-miR-4454 were increased in active vs. non-active uveitis and in active vs. control, thus indicating presence of active uveitis. |
| Conclusion | This study is the first to demonstrate different expression profiles of miRNAs in JIA patients with and without uveitis, as well as active and non-active ocular disease. If verified in larger studies, these findings may enable to identify JIA patients prone to develop uveitis and detect activity of the disease. |
| Conflict of interest | No |
Authors 1
| Last name | BEN-DAVID |
| Initials of first name(s) | G. |
| Department | Department of Ophthalmology, Rabin Medical Center |
| City | Petah Tikva |
| Country | Israel |
Authors 2
| Last name | Sharon |
| Initials of first name(s) | Y. |
| Department | Department of Ophthalmology, Rabin Medical Center |
| City | Petah Tikva |
| Country | Israel |
Authors 3
| Last name | Pillar |
| Initials of first name(s) | S. |
| Department | The Goldschleger Eye Institute, The Chaim Sheba Medical Center, Tel-Hashomer |
| City | Ramat Gan |
| Country | Israel |
Authors 4
| Last name | Nisgav |
| Initials of first name(s) | Y. |
| Department | Department of Ophthalmology, Rabin Medical Center |
| City | Petah Tikva |
| Country | Israel |
Authors 5
| Last name | Pillar |
| Initials of first name(s) | N. |
| Department | Sackler Faculty of Medicine, Tel Aviv University |
| City | Tel Aviv |
| Country | Israel |
Authors 6
| Last name | Amarilyo |
| Initials of first name(s) | G. |
| Department | Department of Pediatric Rheumatology, Schneider Children's Medical Center |
| City | Petah Tikva |
| Country | Israel |
Authors 7
| Last name | Harel |
| Initials of first name(s) | L. |
| Department | Department of Pediatric Rheumatology, Schneider Children's Medical Center |
| City | Petah Tikva |
| Country | Israel |
Authors 8
| Last name | Shapira |
| Initials of first name(s) | G. |
| Department | Sackler Faculty of Medicine, Tel Aviv University |
| City | Tel Aviv |
| Country | Israel |
Authors 9
| Last name | Shomron |
| Initials of first name(s) | N. |
| Department | Sackler Faculty of Medicine, Tel Aviv University |
| City | Tel Aviv |
| Country | Israel |
Authors 10
| Last name | Kramer |
| Initials of first name(s) | M. |
| Department | Department of Ophthalmology, Rabin Medical Center |
| City | Petah Tikva |
| Country | Israel |
