Objective There are few researches for the serum betatrophin level and diabetic nephropathy (DN) recently.The aim of this study was to investigate the change of serum betatrophin level and the correlation of serum betatrophin and urinary albumin-to-creatintine ratio (UACR) in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM).Methods A total of 150 Chinese subjects from Mar 2013 to Jul 2016 were enrolled in the study, including 90 patients with type 2 diabetes and 60 healthy controls.According to the level of UACR, the diabetic patients were divided into two groups:normal UACR group (UACR<30 mg/g, n=60) and abnormal UACR group(UACR>30 mg/g, n=30).Serum betatrophin was measured by enzyme linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA).UACR was measured by turbidimetric inhibition immune assay.Blood glucose blood lipid were measured simultaneously.Results The serum betatrophin level was significantly higher in abnormal UACR group than that in normal UACR group[677.37±59.02 vs 486.13±41.22 pg/mL, P<0.05];Serum betatrophin level in T2DM patients was positively correlated with age (r=0.246), waist hip ratio (WHR) (r=0.240), fasting blood glucose (FPG) (r=0.234), 2 hour plasma glucose (2hPG) (r=0.363), glycosylated hemoglobin (HbA1c) (r=0.346), fasting insulin (FINS) (r=0.249), insulin resistance index (HOMA-IR) (r=0.309), blood urea nitrogen (BUN) (r=0.223), creatinine (CREA) (r=0.277) and UACR (r=0.244) (P<0.05),and negatively correlated with glomerular filtration rate (GFR) (r=0.308) (P<0.01).Serum betatrophin level in normal UACR group was positively correlated with age, HbA1c and UACR (P<0.05);Serum betatrophin level in abnormal UACR group was positively correlated with WHR (r=0.504), 2hPG (r=0.600), HbA1c (r=0.449), HOMA-IR (r=0.395) (P<0.05).The WHR, HbA1c, HOMA-IR and GFR were the influential factors of the serum betatrophin level.Conclusion The level of serum betatrophin was significantly increased in T2DM patients with albuminuria, which suggests that the betatrophin might play an important role in the pathogenesis of DN.

Pancreatic cancer has poor prognosis and lymph node metastasis is a poor prognostic factor in patients with resectable pancreatic cancer. The metastatic prevalence of para-aortic lymph node (PALN) ranges from 9.1% to 26.5% and it is listed as the distant metastatic group in pancreatic cancer. Nevertheless, it is controversial whether PALN metastasis is the contraindication of surgery in resectable pancreatic cancer for the shortage of level Ⅰ evidence.This study concluded that PALN metastasis indicated poor prognosis in patients with pancreatic cancer, but some patients with PALN metastases could benefit from surgery and their survival could be much improved after the combination of surgery and adjuvant therapy. Therefore, it is not wise to refuse surgery for all pancreatic cancer patients with PALN metastasis and the clinicians can cautiously choose the patients to do surgery. Besides, there are mainly retrospective studies rather than prospective and multicenter studies to explore the prognosis of pancreatic cancer patients with PALN metastasis. Thus, more prospective and multicenter studies are needed to decide whether PALN metastasis is an independent prognostic factor in patients with resectable pancreatic cancer.