الفهرس 
ContentsOnly 14 pages are availabe for public view
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Abstract
Vitiligo is an acquired multifactorial depigmentation skin disease, caused by selective immune-mediated death of melanocytes, with an estimated global prevalence of 1%. Both humoral as well as cell-mediated autoimmune responses are involved in melanocyte destruction. Studying the cytokine profile can give an impression on the disease condition; and the use of these cytokines for development of new laboratory test for diagnosis of vitiligo can serve as potential biomarkers for monitoring and assessment of this autoimmune disease. Interleukin (IL-15) is a pleiotropic cytokine that increases both innate and antigen-specific immune responses, and has been implicated in the pathogenesis of several autoimmune diseases. Among pleiotropic functions, IL-15 acts as a pro-inflammatory cytokine and stimulates self-reactive memory T cells which are the main source of INF-γ that is mainly responsible for development of vitiligo. The aim of this study was to evaluate the diagnostic value of IL-15 for vitiligo, to assess its relationship to clinical parameters of the disease, and to examine the possible correlation between serum IL-15 level and disease severity and activity.< In a case-control-design, the serum IL-15 level of 30 patients suffering from active vitiligo and 30 patients with stable vitiligo was determined, and compared with 30 age- and sex-matched healthy controls. Patients and control participants were the Dermatology Outpatient Clinic of between July 2019 and August 2020. Approval of the study protocol was obtained from the Institutional Review Board of Mansoura Faculty of Medicine. All participants were subjected to detailed history taking, complete clinical examination, and estimation of serum level of IL-15 using enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. Clinical assessment of vitiligo lesions was performed to determine the distribution, clinical variant, and vitiligo extent score (VES) was used for the estimation of the affected body surface area. Serum levels of IL-15 were significantly increased in vitiligo patients (72.1 pg/ml) compared to controls (13.9 pg/ml), and showed a significant positive correlation with severity (VES) of the disease. No significant differences were found regarding IL-15 level according to gender, smoking, stress and clinical type in all vitiligo cases; as well as in stable and active vitiligo cases. The receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve of IL-15 showed excellent area under the ROC curve (AUC) value; and the best cut off point for IL-15 was determined to be ≥ 18.5 pg/ml, which was able to predict vitiligo with 98.3 % sensitivity, 83.3 % specificity, and accuracy was 93.3%. ROC curve of IL-15 was also conducted to evaluate the sensitivity and specificity of serum IL-15 as a diagnostic index for discrimination between active and stable vitiligo cases, but AUC was low. Higher IL-15 level was found as independent predictor of vitiligo development and severity, but not activity. CONCLUSIONS : The results of this study indicate that serum IL-15 could be a promising marker in the diagnosis of vitiligo, and also can be used as a prognostic marker for its severity. This can help to identify IL-15 as a potential therapeutic target for this psychologically devastating disorder.