Association of Serum Visfatin and Diabetes Mellitus: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Abstract

Visfatin is a newly discovered adipocytokine hormone, which exerts an insulin-like effect by binding to the insulin receptor-1. However, the role of visfatin in diabetes mellitus (DM) remains controversial. The purpose of the present study was to investigate the correlation between fasting serum visfatin and glucose in DM by systematically reviewing available literature linking visfatin to DM for a comprehensive understanding of the relationship between circulating visfatin level and DM in humans. The protocol for this study was registered in PROSPERO in accordance with the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA). Online literature searches were performed using PubMed, Embase, Ebsco MEDLINE, Science Direct, Scopus, Web of Science and Cochrane databases to retrieve studies published from September 2011 to September 2021. The difference of visfatin levels of patients with DM was measured by standardised mean difference (SMD) and 95% confidence interval (CI) using the Review Manager 5.3 and Stat 12.0.Pearson’s correlation coefficient was used to analyze the data. 12 articles met the inclusion criteria, with 500 participants included in studies. The quantitative meta-analysis revealed no significant difference in circulating visfatin levels and serum fasting glucose (95% CI = -0.244), P = 0.444). It was observed that visfatin levels were negatively correlated with fasting serum glucose. Serum visfatin levels reported in all twelve studies dealing with its relationship with diabetes mellitus. Overall mean of all studies was 11.46 ng/ml (95% CI: 5.78-17.13) with I²=94.63% which shows significant heterogeneity. Overall mean Fasting blood Glucose level of all studies was 138.15 mg/dl (95% CI: 110.16-166.14) with I2 =90.74% which shows homogenicity is all studies. At 95% confidence level, Pearson coefficient of mean depicted negative correlation (-0.244) between serum visfatin and fasting blood glucose which was non-significant (p= 0.444). This indicated heterogenicity that not all studies followed the same association among the two. Publication bias came out to be small for both serum visfatin and fasting glucose. The evidence indicated that circulating visfatin level is negatively correlated to DM.