Clinical value of circ-PNPT1 on adverse pregnancy outcomes of patients with gestational diabetes mellitus.

Several circular RNAs are associated with important pathophysiological characteristics of gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM). This study intended to measure the expression of circ-PNPT1 in sera of GDM patients and to expound on its values on pregnancy outcomes.

Methods: About 104 GDM patients and 71 healthy controls were recruited. The expression pattern of serum circ-PNPT1 was measured by reverse transcription-quantitative polymerase chain reaction. The diagnostic efficacy of circ-PNPT1 and fasting blood glucose (FBG) on GDM was evaluated by receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis. Parameters of glycolipid metabolism were determined using automatic biochemical analyzers. The correlation between circ-PNPT1 and glycolipid metabolism parameters was analyzed using Pearson analysis. GDM patients were divided into a high expression group and a low expression group based on the median value of circ-PNPT1 expression. Curves of adverse neonatal outcomes were drawn by Log Rank analysis.

Results: GDM patients exhibited higher circ-PNPT1 expression than healthy controls. The area under the ROC curve of circ-PNPT1 diagnosing GDM was 0.9184 and the cut-off value was 1.435 (90.38% sensitivity, 85.92% specificity). Serum circ-PNPT1 expression was positively correlated with FBG, total cholesterol, and triglyceride in GDM patients. Neonates born to GDM patients with high circ-PNPT1 expression were prone to adverse outcomes.

Conclusion: Circ-PNPT1 was highly-expressed in the sera of GDM patients. Circ-PNPT1 affected glycolipid metabolism and its expression had certain reference values on adverse pregnancy outcomes.