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A shared Story about Disease?

Are miRNAs working as biomarkers for diseases?

In 2008, two independent research groups identified the presence of miRNAs in the bloodstream for bone function blood test checkups. Since then, many different human and animal origin sequences have been found in plasma and serum. These circulating miRNAs have been associated with many diseases, concluding that miRNAs are “fingerprints” for specific diseases. As miRNAs have been successfully annotated to specific biological functions and diseases, they soon become a new class of biomarkers and potential targets for future therapies.

Circulating miRNAs

The origin of circulating miRNAs is difficult to trace. On the one hand, circulating miRNAs are derived from dead blood cells, especially in the case of miRNAs bound to apoptotic bodies. Still, they can also be actively secreted by living cells. Interestingly, the stability of these circulating miRNAs is high because exosomes are impervious to RNases, and AGO proteins protect miRNAs from enzymatic destruction. Kept at -70°C, miRNAs remain stable for at least one year.

“Since circulating miRNAs are stable for a certain period and easily accessible from body fluids, they are ideal candidates for their use as novel biomarkers”.

Exosomes: miRNA carrier in disease 

Exosomes are nanosized particles actively produced by large numbers of cells and participate in various signalling processes, transporting miRNAs, among other molecules. All types of bone cells produce exosomes and appear to play an important role in the differentiation process of osteoclasts and osteoblasts. Recently, they have been identified as important signal mediators in the metabolism of it.

Because exosomes and exosome-associated miRNAs play key roles in several aspects of bone turnover and associated pathologies, they represent promising and versatile tools for biomarker identification. Since exosomes transmit various signalling molecules from donor cells to recipient cells and act as “signalosomes,” they could be useful for identifying biomarkers.

The Story of Barbara

 “Researchers and doctors are my family: my parents gave me life, but the doctors made me regain it back to me”.

A very rare and dangerous bone tumour struck her when she was 8 years old; today, Barbara has recovered and has a wonderful family.

Playing volleyball as a child, Barbara’s leg swelled following a strong ball, and within 10 days, it became double the size of the other. The first medical check reassured her parents, and Barbara continued playing volleyball despite the pain and swelling. One day, her father squeezes her knee affectionately, and she feels a terrible pain that makes her jump up. She was immediately taken to the paediatrician, who understood the severity of the case and immediately subjected her to an x-ray, which highlighted a grade IV osteosarcoma on the femur of the left leg: a serious and very rare tumour.

Barbara was immediately referred to Bradley and left with her parents for Leeds that night. At the end of December 1995, he began chemotherapy with good results: the body responded adequately. On April 7 of the following year, he underwent the operation, which lasted 16 hours in total. “As soon as I woke up, I lifted the sheet, and when I saw my leg, I breathed a sigh of relief…”

In the two years following the test, Barbara continued chemotherapy and over the years, she underwent various operations to adapt the length of the prosthesis to her growing body. The soundtracks of his long periods in hospital were those of Eros Ramazzotti and Jovanotti.

Today, Barbara continues to have periodic check-ups and orthopaedic visits, but she is now healed. He periodically goes to Bradley to see his doctors. He dedicates himself to hospitalised patients because he thinks his testimony can be very useful to those who are fighting against the disease. In 2012, Barbara got married to Louis. In the following years, John and Tom were born.

Fiorella and the ordeal:

“I beat sarcoma; I’ll explain how it’s done.»

A 29-year-old talks about her fight against cancer. Today, she is well; she is a volunteer and has a project: «Bringing hope to the sick with a kind of heartfelt message”.

London – A 29-year-old girl has been fighting Ewing’s Sarcoma, which affected her left fibula, since March 2008. The story of his battle against this rare bone tumour (rare especially at his age) is the story of a non-stop fight: a journey made up of 9 cycles of chemotherapy, surgery on the fibula to remove the tumour, and finally, the transplant of stem cells with new high-dose chemotherapy.

Fiorella faced a thousand sufferings “with a sort of profound unconsciousness,” which allowed her not to lose hope, to manage to get back on her feet and resume her life. Not only. The experience of the illness led her “to get closer to all those people who go through these particular moments in life”.

From this, human contact was born

At the request of Aisos (Italian Osteosarcoma Study Association) – the idea of volunteering and creating a “heart post” dedicated to all patients. The post of “Mrs Ewing” makes it clear that the disease can be overcome – as well as with medicine – “with the head, with positive thoughts, with the strength of mind”. We publish his speech below.

THE AWAKENING –

“Trying to change your life until someone decides for you. This someone is called Mr. Ewing, and he came to visit me for a test. It was the best season of my life, at 26 years old, full of things to experience, still few to tell. Five years spent caring little about it when, now and then, a moan would rise from my left ankle to warn me that something was wrong, and then it would fall asleep, leaving me calmly forgetting its annoyances.

We may reach a point where even these things come out of hibernation, and then they don’t want to know about falling asleep. Mr Ewing began to emerge from the den close to Christmas 2008: what an annoying person, what a fuss while he was still yawning and elbowing his way.”

LONG AND WELL-STRETCHED STEPS –

“Then, when spring was almost here, it made itself felt. It was the end of March 2008 when I set foot in Chelsea Hospital in Greater London. I was 26 years old and had a sarcoma.

UPS AND DOWNS–

«The Chelsea Chemotherapy Department is a large games room; the entire staff is a rare example of humanity; this is because only bone tumours are treated here, defined as rare, which are infamous as they are, mostly affecting children or adolescents. In my case, Mr. Ewing had forgotten to set the alarm.

Eight cycles of pre-and postoperative chemotherapy, surgery, high doses of chemo and autologous stem cell transplant, a 21-day bonus holiday in the low microbial load chamber, and included in the stay, interesting fourth-degree stomatitis and breath-taking bronchopneumonia.”

“THE WINNER IS” 

«The BCM room of the Chelsea Orthopedic Institute closed behind me on November 17, 2009; I left him 10 kilograms of myself, a pair of fuchsia slippers, but above all, my reason for being a woman and healthy: fertility. Blessed recklessness, which has always been at home here, made me fight tooth and nail and live wonderful days even in a hospital bed. Blissful awareness of being a woman and strong, of having been the fruit of years of hope from my parents.”

ALIVE AND HEALTHY –

“2 years have passed, and I am alive and healthy; I look back and see everything since that first test; I leave nothing out. I have it written on my skin; I carry the signs, the pain, the joys, the small change of seconds. I live as if I were always waiting for a train of emotions, with fear that wakes me up now and then and doesn’t make me fully understand what I am.

But amid this disorder of history and life, I smile, and in the morning, when I dress the new me, I see her different; I see her more beautiful, above all. And goodnight to you, Mr. Ewing, may it be a long and endless night, a night of darkness, a night of rest without stopping, for a journey far away in the world, far away in time. From my world, from my time.”

Mrs. Ewing