Introduction

Gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) is an independent type of diabetes mellitus, which refers to the abnormal glucose tolerance of pregnant women or is first discovered during pregnancy, and it is one of the most common complications in the first and second stages of pregnancy.^1,2 In China, the incidence of diabetes is rapidly rising, while the incidence of GDM is about 12.2%.³ During GDM, pregnant women will have abnormal blood glucose regulation, lipid metabolism, immune function and cardiopulmonary function to varying degrees,⁴ and may have pregnancy-related complications, such as pregnancy-related hypertension, eclampsia or abortion, premature birth, malformation.⁵ Although blood glucose level in patients with GDM usually returns to normal after delivery, in the long term, women with a history of GDM are more likely to develop type 2 diabetes,⁶ and their babies are more likely to be overweight or obese later in life.⁷ Therefore, prevention and early diagnosis of GDM are of great important to avoid adverse effects. In the past, scholars tried to identify and search for biomarkers of GDM, such as HbA1c⁸ and adiponectin.⁹ However, they were not effectively applied in clinical practice due to various reasons.

Long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) have attracted the attention of scholars under the current research background. LncRNAs are a class of functional RNA molecules with a length of more than 200 nucleotides, which regulate gene expression at the epigenetic, transcriptional and post-transcriptional levels and extensively participate in most processes of the organism growth.^10,11 Numerous studies have proved that lncRNAs are involved in the occurrence and development of diseases, including cancer,¹² cardiovascular disease,¹³ and autoimmune disease.¹⁴ LncRNA HOTAIR is located on chromosome 12q13, and it has been found to be abnormally expressed in various cancers.¹⁵ Existing studies have demonstrated that HOTAIR is elevated in the liver tissues of patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) and mice fed with a high-fat diet. In addition, the upregulation of HOTAIR promotes hepatic insulin resistance through the AKT/GSK pathway.¹⁶ Another study confirmed that levels of HOTAIR in PBMCs were significantly enhanced in patients with T2DM compared with normal glucose tolerance group.¹⁷ At present, the evidence has confirmed the association between HOTAIR and T2DM, but there are few studies on the correlation between HOTAIR and GDM.

In our study, blood samples were collected to measure the expression of HOTAIR in GDM and healthy pregnant women. In addition, we also studied the clinical diagnostic value of HOTAIR in GDM and evaluated the correlation between HOTAIR and clinical indicators as well …….

Source: https://www.dovepress.com/long-non-coding-rna-hotair-expression-and-clinical-significance-in-pat-peer-reviewed-fulltext-article-IJGM