What is the relationship of FGF-23 to heart failure?
A Heart failure (HF) is an increasingly common syndrome associated with high morbidity, elevated hospital readmission rates, and high mortality. Improving diagnosis, prognosis, and treatment of HF requires a better understanding of its different sub-phenotypes. As researchers gained a comprehensive understanding of neurohormonal activation—one of the hallmarks of HF—they discovered several biomarkers, including natriuretic peptides, which now are playing an important role in sub-phenotyping HF and in driving more personalized management of this chronic condition.
Like the natriuretic peptides, fibroblast growth factor 23 (FGF-23) could become important in risk-stratifying and managing HF patients. Produced by osteocytes, FGF-23 is a key regulator of phosphorus homeostasis. It binds to renal and parathyroid FGF-Klotho receptor heterodimers, resulting in phosphate excretion, decreased 1-α-hydroxylation of 25-hydroxyvitamin D, and decreased parathyroid hormone (PTH) secretion. The relationship to PTH is important because impaired homeostasis of cations and decreased glomerular filtration rate might contribute to the rise of FGF-23. The amino-terminal portion of FGF-23 (amino acids 1-24) serves as a signal peptide allowing secretion into the blood, and the carboxyl-terminal portion (aa 180-251) participates in its biological action.
How might FGF-23 improve HF risk assessment?
Studies have shown that FGF-23 is related to the risk of cardiovascular diseases and mortality. It was first demonstrated that FGF-23 levels were independently associated with left ventricular mass index and hypertrophy as well as mortality in patients with chronic kidney disease (CKD). FGF-23 also has been associated with left ventricular dysfunction and atrial fibrillation in coronary artery disease subjects, even in the absence of impaired renal function.
FGF-23 and FGF receptors are both expressed in the myocardium. It is possible that FGF-23 has direct effects on the heart and participates in the physiopathology of cardiovascular diseases and HF. Experiments have shown that for in vitro cultured rat cardiomyocytes, FGF-23 stimulates pathological hypertrophy by activating the calcineurin-NFAT pathway—and in wild-type mice—the intra-myocardial or intravenous injection of FGF-23 resulted in left ventricular hypertrophy. As such, FGF-23 appears to be a potential stimulus of myocardial hypertrophy, and increased levels may contribute to the worsening of heart failure and long-term cardiovascular death.
Researchers have documented that HF patients have elevated FGF-23 circulating levels. They have also found a significant correlation between plasma levels of FGF-23 and B-type natriuretic peptide, a biomarker related to ventricular stretch and cardiac hypertrophy, in patients with left ventricular hypertrophy. As such, measuring FGF-23 levels might be a useful tool to predict long-term adverse cardiovascular events in HF patients.
Interestingly, researchers have documented a significant relationship between FGF-23 and PTH in both CKD and HF patients. As PTH stimulates FGF-23 expression, it could be that in HF patients, increased PTH levels increase the bone expression of FGF-23, which enhances its effects on the heart.
Monitoring FGF-23 might offer added value to current biomarkers and contribute to more personalized care for HF patients. Since FGF-23 contributes to cardiovascular remodeling, clinical indications for FGF-23 testing might also include early evidence of pre-diastolic dysfunction, as well as predicting adverse cardiovascular outcomes. A better understanding of FGF-23 also is providing potential new therapeutic targets and companion assays to monitor HF drug treatment efficacy.
Damien Gruson, PhD, is an associate laboratory director in the department of laboratory medicine at Cliniques Universitaires St-Luc, Bruxelles, Belgium. +Email: [email protected]