Clinical association and diagnostic significance of miRNA-29a and miRNA-147b in type 2 diabetes mellitus

Background: Micro RNAs (miRs) expression is involved in the pathogenesis of type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). This study investigates the expression levels of plasma miR-29a, miR-146a, and miR-147b and their correlations with clinical parameters in patients with T2DM. Methods: 105 patients with T2DM who categorized either as newly diagnosed T2DM (n=52) or treated T2DM (n=53) and 93 healthy individuals were included in this study. The expression levels of miR-29a, miR-146a, and miR-147b were quantified by real-time PCR and analyzed for possible association with T2DM. Results: The expressions of miR-29a and miR-147b were significantly increased in T2DM patients compared with healthy controls (P<0.0001). The expression levels of miR-29a in newly diagnosed T2DM patients were higher than that in the group of treated T2DM (P=0.002). The expression of studied miRs was correlated with several clinical parameters such as blood glucose levels, HbA1C, microalbuminuria, C-peptide, triglyceride levels as well as the HOMA-beta index. The expression levels of miR-29a and miR-147b show a potential diagnostic performance to discriminate newly diagnostic T2DM (AUCs=0.77 and 0.84, respectively) and beta-cell dysfunction (AUCs= 0.62 and 0.75, respectively). Conclusions: The plasma miR-29a and miR-147b expression levels in T2DM patients are significantly associated with T2DM while miR-146a shows poor evidence in relation to T2DM. miR-147b shows potential as a biomarker for the diagnosis of T2DM and pancreatic beta cell dysfunction.