Serum soluble TWEAK levels in severe traumatic brain injury and its prognostic significance.
BACKGROUND
Severe traumatic brain injury (sTBI) is characterized by a high mortality. Tumor necrosis factor-like weak inducer of apoptosis (TWEAK) participates in inflammation. We determined serum soluble TWEAK (sTWEAK) levels with respect to its prognostic ability.


METHODS
This was a single-center prospective, observational study that was performed from December 2014 to December 2017. A total of 114 sTBI patients who met the inclusion criteria and 114 randomly selected healthy controls were included in the study. Serum sTWEAK levels were gauged. Patients were followed-up until death or completion of 6 months. Poor outcome was referred to as Glasgow outcome scale score of 1-3.


RESULTS
In comparison with controls, patients displayed predominantly higher serum sTWEAK levels. Serum sTWEAK levels were strongly correlated with Glasgow coma scale scores and serum C-reactive protein levels. 32 patients (28.1%) died and 60 patients (52.6%) suffered from a poor outcome. Receiver operating characteristic curve analysis clearly showed that serum sTWEAK levels had substantially high predictive performance for 6-month mortality and poor outcome. Serum sTWEAK emerged as an independent predictor for 6-month mortality, overall survival and poor outcome.


CONCLUSIONS
Raised serum sTWEAK levels are closely related to increasing inflammatory response, elevated trauma severity and worse clinical outcome after sTBI.
['Tang|Bei|B|', 'Zhong|Ze|Z|', 'Qiu|Zheng|Z|', 'Wu|Hui-Ping|HP|', 'Hu|Jia-Yuan|JY|', 'Ma|Jian-Ping|JP|', 'Wu|Jin-Ping|JP|']
D000293:Adolescent D000328:Adult D000368:Aged D000070642:Brain Injuries, Traumatic D016022:Case-Control Studies D000074049:Cytokine TWEAK D005260:Female D006801:Humans D008297:Male D008875:Middle Aged D011379:Prognosis D012372:ROC Curve D012995:Solubility D055815:Young Adult
Severity Traumatic brain injury Tumor necrosis factor-like weak inducer of apoptosis Inflammation Prognosis