REFERENCE INTERVALS OF SERUM HYALURONIC ACID IN AN ADULT NIGERIAN POPULATION: A PILOT STUDY

Purpose: To determine age and gender-specific reference intervals of hyaluronic acid (HA) in healthy Nigerian Igbos living at Nnewi, as reference for interpreting clinical laboratory values of HA. Materials And Methods: Eighty healthy volunteers were partitioned into two age groups: group 1 (participants 30 years and above) and group 2 (participants 29 years and below). Each group comprised twenty males and twenty females. Five milliliters of venous blood was collected from each participant and measured for serum level of HA by using the CORGENIX HA Test kit (Broomfield, Colorado, USA). Obtained data was analysed using descriptive statistics of frequency count, range, mean and standard deviation, and inferential statistics of independent t-test and Pearson product moment correlation at 0.05 level of significance. Results: There were significant correlations between serum HA and each of age (r=0.76;p<0.01) and BMI (r=-0.34;p=0.03) among the participants. The males had significantly higher level of serum HA than their female counterparts in each group (p<0.05). Group1 participants had significantly higher HA level than group 2 participants (t=9.49; p<0.01). In group 1, the reference interval for serum HA level for males and females were 19.44 - 25.87ng/ml and 19.55 - 23.35ng/ml respectively whereas the reference interval for the males and females in group 2 were 15.12 - 23.10ng/ml and 13.42 - 21.96ng/ml respectively. Conclusion: Reference levels of serum HA increase with age and tend to be higher in males than females. Multi-center studies using larger sample sizes are recommended to establish reference intervals for the Nigerian population.