TUESDAY, Dec. 11 (HealthDay News) -- In patients with Graves ophthalmopathy, the most frequent extrathyroidal manifestation of Graves disease, a marker of oxidative stress is high with active disease and drops after treatment with corticosteroids, according to a report in the December issue of the Archives of Ophthalmology.
Chieh-Chih Tsai, M.D., from National Yang-Ming University in Taipei, Taiwan, and colleagues monitored the levels of 8-hydroxy-2-deoxyguanosine (8-OHdG) in the urine of eight euthyroid patients with active Graves ophthalmopathy before and after systemic treatment with corticosteroids. Nine matched healthy individuals served as controls.
The researchers found that the mean 8-OHdG levels were significantly higher in Graves patients than controls before treatment and fell after corticosteroid treatment. The drop in 8-OHdG levels after treatment was accompanied by decreases in clinical activity and ophthalmopathy index scores. The levels of 8-OHdG rose again in two patients with recurrent active Graves ophthalmopathy whose corticosteroid treatment was tapered or withdrawn.
"Oxidative stress may have a role in the pathogenesis of Graves ophthalmopathy," Tsai and colleagues conclude. "Urinary 8-OHdG level can be used not only as a non-invasive biomarker of oxidative stress in patients having Graves ophthalmopathy but also as an objective and quantitative parameter in the follow-up of patients during immunosuppressive treatment."
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