It was planned in this work to clarify the role of endothelin and nitric oxide as markers of endothelium malfunction which is a gate of vascular complications in diabetes mellitus. In order to achieve this goal, this study was carried out on 75 subjects. 60 of them were diabetic patients, classified into 2 groups. Group I consisted of 35 non-insulin dependent diabetics with mean age of 50.24 + 17.29 years including 18 males and 17 females. Group II consisted of 25 insulin dependent diabetics with mean age of 37.73 + 13.15 years including 14 males and I I females. merest 15 subjects were well cross-matched apparent healthy volunteers with mean age of 45.13 + 10.52 years including 9 ales and 6 females as a control group or group IIL All subjects under study were subjected to a thorough history and clinical examination. Also, all subjects under study were subjected to laboratory investigations including fasting and 2-hours post-prandial plasma glucose, glycated hemoglobin, urine analysis for microalbumin, serurn creatinine level, lipid pattern including total cholesterol, triglycerides, HDL-cholesterol and LDL-cholesterol, plasma level of ndothelin and plasma level of nitric oxide. According to the results obtained from this study it was found that: There was a significant increase of plasma level of endothelin and decrease of plasma level of nitric oxide in diabetic patients when compared to the control group. The changes in endothelin and nitric oxide levels in diabetic patients were more obvious in the poor controlled diabetic patients. There was no significant difference in plasma Level of endothelin and nitric oxide between insulin-dependent diabetic patients and non-insulin-dependent diabetic atients. The clinical complications (as retinopathy, hypertension, nephropathy and periph- 669
El-Sayed Kaood et at.. eral neuritis) became more sever with the increase in endoth.elin level and with the decrease in n tric oxide leveL |
