Assessment of Gonadotropin Levels and their Ratio in Gallstones Patients in Khartoum State

Abstract

Background: Gallstone disease is the most common gastrointestinal disorder affecting the biliary system which occurs when hard fatty or mineral deposits of either cholesterol or bilirubin form in gallbladder.Many studies have shown the risk of estrogen hormone to be one of gallstone causes which can be reflected by the change inregulatory gonadotropin and their ratio. Therefore, present study aimed to evaluate gonadotropin (FSH and LH) level and their ratio and their correlation with study variables among gallstones Sudanese patients in Khartoum state. Materials and methods: In cross sectional hospital base study n=60 subjects were enrolled, then classified into two groups, n=30 clinically diagnosed gallstone patients age ranged from (18 to 77) as case group, and n= 30 apparently healthy individuals as control matched. Serum level of FSH and LH were measured using sandwich ELISA technique and FSH/LH ratio was calculated. Results: Analyses of frequency showed that, gallstone disease is more common in females (73%) than males (27%), abnormal high weight (70%) than normal weight (30%) and in Postmenopause (63.7%) than Premenopause (36.3%). Concerning contraceptive use, (60%) had used contraceptive in their life compared to (40%) never used.Moreover, independent t-test revealed that, the level of FSH is greatly higher in female than male(p-value 0.002), while FSH/LH ratio is significantly decreasein gallstone patients in comparison with control group (p-value 0.010).In addition person’s correlation results notedpositive correlation between FSH and age (R-value 0.354 and P-value 0.045(, moreover negative correlation was observed betweenFSH/LH ratio and BMI (R-value 0.424 and P-value 0.011). Conclusion: The study concludes that, gallstones are common in obese postmenopausal Sudanese women also contraceptive used is a risk factor of gallstone formation in our population. Gallstone patients had lower FSH: LH ratio, thus monitoring of ratio is recommended.