الفهرس 
IntroductionOnly 14 pages are availabe for public view
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Abstract
This study was designed to evaluate the serum level of the pro-inflammatory cytokines in children with autism spectrum disorder and to test its use as a biomarker of autism and its impact on disease severity. Background : Autism is a neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by repetitive, stereotypic behavior and impaired expressive communications. Despite the unknown etiology of this disorder, accumulating evidences suggest that the immune system plays a potential role in the pathogenesis of ASD.the pro-inflammatory cytokines in children with autism spectrum disorder and to test its use as a biomarker of autism and its impact on disease severity.Methods : Forty-two children with ASD diagnosed according to the DSM-V criteria with age ranging from 3 to 17 years and forty-two healthy children of comparable age and gender as a control group were involved in our study, both groups were not maintained on medications and they were subjected to clinical ,psychiatric examination and measurement of serum Interleukin -6 levels. Results: Serum IL-6 levels were significantly higher in children with ASD compared to control children with median serum interleukin -6 level about 7.89 pg/ ml in cases versus 0 in control group with p value <0.001. We also found a statistically significant strong positive correlation between serum IL-6 level and severity score of ASD (r=0.897). Higher median IL-6 was detected among cases with severe autism (54.99 ) followed by moderate (7.84) and the least for mild cases (1.58) and a statistically significant association between median IL-6 and clinical features of autism with higher median IL-6 among cases with no response to social smile, stereotypic behavior, no eye contact, delayed language and no response to own name(44.11, 24.91, 19.78 ,11.39, 11.22)versus(2.85 ,2.196 ,1.63 ,2.038 ,2.47). Conclusion: Elevated levels of IL-6 in children with ASD and its statistically significant association with clinical features and severity scores of the disorder indicates that IL-6 may not only plays an important role in the etiology of autism, but it may also provide a potential biological marker that enables the determination of disease severity and highlighted a new promising pathway for novel therapeutic intervention for ASD through manipulation of increased IL-6 level aiming to better management of ASD.