Pergialiotis Vasilios, Tagkou Nikoletta Maria, Tsimpiktsioglou Athina, Klavdianou Olga, Neonaki Antonia, Trompoukis Pantelis
Laboratory of Experimental Surgery and Surgical Research N.S. Christeas, Athens, Greece.
Third Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Attikon University Hospital, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Athens, Greece.Electronic Address:
Int J Fertil Steril. 2019 Apr;13(1):1-5. doi: 10.22074/ijfs.2019.5488. Epub 2019 Jan 6.
Urocortin (UCN) is a neuropeptide that belongs to the corticotrophin-releasing hormone family and is expressed by eutopic and ectopic human endometria. The past years, this expression has been thoroughly investigated in the field of endometriosis. The objective of this systematic review is to accumulate current evidence related to the expression of UCN in tissue and blood samples of patients suffering from endometriosis. Literature search was designed according to the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines and primarily conducted using the Medline (1966-2018), Scopus (2004-2018), EMBASE (1947-2018) and Clinicaltrials.gov (2008- 2018) databases, along with the reference lists of electronically retrieved full-text papers. Overall, eight studies were retrieved. Current evidence suggests that the expression of UCN is increased in patients with ovarian endometriomas and that its levels may correlate with the severity of the disease. The diagnostic efficacy of UCN1 plasma levels was evaluated in three studies. Two of them suggested that the sensitivity and specificity of the method may reach, and even exceed, 80%. However, the wide variation in outcome reporting and outcome reporting measures in endometriosis among the included studies precludes meta-analysis of available data. Therefore, although UCN seems to be a promising biomarker for the identification and follow-up of patients that suffer from endometriosis, more studies are needed to reach firm conclusions with respect to its predictive accuracy.
尿皮质素（UCN）是一种神经肽，属于促肾上腺皮质激素释放激素家族，在正常和异位的人子宫内膜中均有表达。在过去几年中，子宫内膜异位症领域对这种表达进行了深入研究。本系统评价的目的是积累与子宫内膜异位症患者组织和血液样本中UCN表达相关的现有证据。文献检索按照系统评价和Meta分析的首选报告项目（PRISMA）指南进行，主要使用Medline（1966 - 2018）、Scopus（2004 - 2018）、EMBASE（1947 - 2018）和Clinicaltrials.gov（2008 - 2018）数据库，以及电子检索的全文论文的参考文献列表。总共检索到八项研究。现有证据表明，卵巢子宫内膜异位囊肿患者中UCN的表达增加，其水平可能与疾病严重程度相关。三项研究评估了UCN1血浆水平的诊断效能。其中两项研究表明该方法的敏感性和特异性可能达到甚至超过80%。然而，纳入研究中子宫内膜异位症结局报告和结局报告测量方法的广泛差异妨碍了对现有数据进行Meta分析。因此，尽管UCN似乎是识别和随访子宫内膜异位症患者的一个有前景的生物标志物，但需要更多研究才能就其预测准确性得出确凿结论。
