Determination of the aminoterminal peptide of procollagen type III and laminin P1 in serum of patients with chronic liver disease.

Serum concentration of the aminoterminal peptide of procollagen type III (P III P) and that of the high-molecular-weight glycoprotein laminin P1 (LP1) were determined by a specific radioimmunoassay (RIA) in patients with different chronic liver diseases. Besides the routine laboratory tests, histological verification of the liver samples obtained by needle biopsy and a complex hepatitis B virus marker analysis by RIA (Biomedica-Sorin), or ELISA (Behringwerke, Marburg, FRG) kits were carried out in order to set up the correct clinical diagnosis. In normal controls, the P III P and LP1 concentrations were 7.8 +/- 1.1 ng/ml (n = 10) and 0.08 +/- 0.1 units/ml (n = 7), respectively. Patients with fatty liver (n = 25) showed a significant elevation in P III P concentration (18.6 +/- 2.7 ng/ml). Such an elevation was not unequivocally demonstrated before. In this group of patients LP1 level was also increased (1.4 +/- 0.2 units/ml, n = 10). In liver cirrhosis (n = 51) both P III P and LP1 concentrations were found to be consistently elevated.