BACKGROUND A recent report suggested that men with vertex balding have higher levels of plasma insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF-1). The association of its major carrier protein, insulin-like growth factor binding protein 3 (IGFBP-3), with male pattern hair loss has not been examined. OBJECTIVE We evaluated the relations of plasma concentrations of IGF-1 and IGFBP-3 with vertex balding in mid...

Insulin-like growth factor-1 (IGF-1) effects on aging and neurodegeneration is still controversial. However, it is widely admitted that IGF-1 is involved in the neuroinflammatory response. In peripheral tissues, several studies showed that IGF-1 inhibited the expression of inflammatory markers, although other studies concluded that IGF-1 has proinflammatory functions. Furthermore, proinflammato...

BACKGROUND Insulin-like growth factors (1GF-1) and insulin-like growth factor binding protein-3 (IGFBP-3) play important roles in cell growth and differentiation. The aim of this work was to investigate the roles of IGF-1 and IGFBP-3 in esophageal cancer. MATERIALS AND METHODS We examined the circulating IGF-1 and IGFBP-3 concentration in 18 healthy controls and 66 esophageal cancer patients ...

Oxidized low-density lipoprotein (LDL) is proatherogenic and induces smooth muscle cell apoptosis, which contributes to atherosclerotic plaque destabilization. We showed previously that oxidized LDL downregulates insulin-like growth factor-1 receptor in human smooth muscle cells and that this is critical for induction of apoptosis. To identify mechanisms, we exposed smooth muscle cells to 60 mu...

The insulin-like growth factor system (insulin-like growth factor 1, insulin-like growth factor 2, insulin-like growth factor 1 receptor, insulin-like growth factor 2 receptor and six insulin-like growth factor-binding proteins) and insulin are essential to muscle metabolism and most aspects of male and female reproduction. Insulin-like growth factor and insulin play important roles in the regu...

The prevalence of obesity, metabolic syndrome, and type 2 diabetes mellitus, and the associated cardiac pathologies are rising to alarming levels. Conventional medical therapies for the prevention and treatment of cardiomyopathy are less effective in patients with these metabolic disorders, and this is attributed, at least in part, to a limited understanding of the cellular and genetic mechanis...

The paper by Morandi et al. (2011), entitled “Insulin-like growth factor-1 and delirium in critically ill mechanically ventilated patients: a preliminary investigation,” is of great interest due to its lack of finding a correlation between serum levels of insulin-like growth factor-1 (IFG-1) and delirium in intensive care unit (ICU) patients. As reviewed recently by Adamis and Meagher (2011), a...