Interleukin-1 receptor antagonist plasma levels correlate with neurofilament light, disability in MS

Plasma levels of interleukin-1 receptor antagonist correlated with cerebrospinal fluid neurofilament light levels and predicted disability among patients with MS, according to a study presented at the ACTRIMS virtual meeting.

This correlation remained regardless of age, sex, disease-modifying therapy and previous relapse activity, the study showed.

“Inflammasomes are intracellular signaling complexes critically important for innate immunity and has an important role in MS. Activation of inflammasomes results in secretion of IL-1[beta],” Stephanie N. Blandford, a PhD candidate at Memorial University of Newfoundland, and colleagues wrote. “Interleukin-1 receptor antagonist (IL-1RA) is an endogenous soluble antagonist of the IL-1 receptor and blocks the proinflammatory effects that are known to contribute to MS pathology.”

To assess the relationship between interleukin-1 receptor antagonist (IL-1RA) plasma levels and disability, and the link to neurofilament light levels in CSF, the researchers gathered demographic and clinical data as well as plasma samples from 96 patients with relapsing-remitting MS (mean age, 43.6 years; women, 75%) and cerebrospinal fluid samples from 64 patients (mean age, 44.6 years; women, 67.2%) with RRMS (54.7%), noninflammatory neurological disease (28.1%) and other inflammatory neurological disease (17.2%) to assess circulating levels of IL-1RA and neurofilament light, according to the study results.

IL-1RA levels demonstrated a relationship with EDSS scores (r = 0.21), but associations between IL-1RA and other variables, such as age and sex, were not significant. The researchers found that CSF levels of IL-1RA were comparable between diagnostic groups and that CSF levels of IL-RA corelated with neurofilament light in all patients. However, the relationship between IL-1RA levels and neurofilament light levels remained only in patients with MS (r = 0.29, P < .05).

“IL-1RA is a novel exploratory biomarker in MS that correlates with CSF, [neurofilament light] and predicts disability independent of age, sex, disease-modifying therapy and previous relapse activity,” the researchers wrote. “CSF IL-1RA is correlated with [neurofilament light].”