TDK conference 2018

The hepcidin (hepatic antibactericid protein) is a protein with antibacterial characteristics produced in the liver; it has an important role in the regulation of the iron homeostasis. The hepcidin decreases the iron concentration of the blood serum primarily with inhibiting the ferroportin-channels in the membrane of the enterocytes and macrophages. It helps to eliminate the body offending microorganisms by cutting off their required iron sources. The erythrocyte production in the red bone marrow decreases because of the low iron concentration of the serum which causes a non-regenerative anaemia. Human experiments confirmed that in patients with acute and chronic inflammatory diseases the hepcidin level is increased, therefore it plays a role in the formation of the chronic or inflammatory disease caused non-regenerative anaemia.

The purpose of this research is to detect serum hepcidin in healthy dogs with a liquid chromatography - mass spectrometry (LC/MS) method which is a ’gold standard’ process according to human practice. Therefore we can compare the serum hepcidin level of healthy dogs to diseased patients in the future. We included 114 dogs in the research. Dogs were considered as healthy based on physical and laboratory examination (haematology, biochemical parameters, blood smear morphology, routine urine examination) results. Serum samples of 86 dogs (44 females and 42 males) were available for the LC/MS measurement. During the assays standard canine hepcidin reagent was used. The reference range of hepcidin in this healthy dog population was 1,4-31,7 ng/ml, average concentration was 16,6 ng/ml (standard deviation: +/- 7,7 ng/ml; minimum: 2,3 ng/ml; maximum: 41,4 ng/ml; median: 14,7 ng/ml).

During our research, the first time in the veterinary practice we developed the LC/MS method for measuring the canine serum hepcidin level and defined the reference range in large population of healthy dogs. With this analysis, detection of the serum hepcidin level can be an accurate method in the future to help to diagnose anaemia of chronic disease in patient presented with non-regenerative anaemia.