Identification of potential serum biomarkers for congenital heart disease children with pulmonary arterial hypertension by metabonomics

Abstract Background Pulmonary arterial hypertension is a common complication in patients with congenital heart disease. In the absence of early diagnosis and treatment, pediatric patients with PAH has a poor survival rate. Here, we explore serum biomarkers for distinguishing children with pulmonary arterial hypertension associated with congenital heart disease (PAH-CHD) from CHD. Methods Samples were analyzed by nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy-based metabolomics and 22 metabolites were further quantified by ultra-high-performance liquid chromatography–tandem mass spectroscopy. Results Serum levels of betaine, choline, S-Adenosyl methionine (SAM), acetylcholine, xanthosine, guanosine, inosine and guanine were significantly altered between CHD and PAH-CHD. Logistic regression analysis showed that combination of serum SAM, guanine and N-terminal pro-brain natriuretic peptide (NT-proBNP), yielded the predictive accuracy of 157 cases was 92.70% with area under the curve of the receiver operating characteristic curve value of 0.9455. Conclusion We demonstrated that a panel of serum SAM, guanine and NT-proBNP is potential serum biomarkers for screening PAH-CHD from CHD.