Is maternal serum endocan level a novel marker in gestational diabetes mellitus?

Aim: To determine whether there was a significant difference between serum endocan levels of pregnant women with and without gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM). Methods: A total of 90 pregnant women, 45 with gestational diabetes and 45 healthy pregnant women, between 24 and 28 gestational weeks, were included in this prospective case–control study. The pregnant women were screened for gestational diabetes using a two‐step protocol. Serum endocan levels were measured using a commercially available enzyme‐linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) kit. A p‐value of <0.05 was considered statistically significant. Results: Serum endocan level was significantly higher in the GDM group than in healthy controls (168.46 ± 160.6 vs. 105.66 ± 26.52 pg/mL, respectively; p < 0.001). Serum endocan concentrations were positively correlated with the results of 50 g oral glucose challenge test (GCT) (p < 0.001). Receiver operating characteristic curve analysis showed that endocan with a cut‐off point of 133.9 ng/dL indicated women with GDM with a sensitivity of 55.6% and specificity of 88.9% (area under the curve [AUC]: 0.737, 95% CI: 0.634–0.824). The overall differential performance of endocan according to the GDM groups was determined as 73.7% (p < 0.001). Maternal serum endocan level was positively correlated with fasting glucose, postprandial glucose, and glycated hemoglobin (HbA1c) (p < 0.001). Conclusions: Elevated endocan levels in gestational diabetes were correlated with fasting glucose, postprandial glucose, HbA1c, and oral glucose tolerance test (OGTT) results. Despite the low sensitivity of 55.6% and the high specificity of 88.9%, we found a high differential performance rate indicating that serum endocan levels were important for the pathophysiology of GDM and should be investigated for the possibility of being a novel marker in larger populations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]