Comparison of Serum and Cerebrospinal Fluid Neurofilament Light Chain Concentrations Measured by Ella™ and Lumipulse™ in Patients with Cognitive Impairment

Overview

Journal Diagnostics (Basel)

Specialty Radiology

Date 2024 Nov 9

PMID 39518375

Authors

Teresa Urbano

Riccardo Maramotti

Manuela Tondelli

Chiara Gallingani

Chiara Carbone

Najara Iacovino

Giulia Vinceti

Giovanna Zamboni

Annalisa Chiari

Roberta Bedin

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Objective: Neurofilament light chain proteins (NfLs) are considered a promising biomarker of neuroaxonal damage in several neurological diseases. Their measurement in the serum and cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) of patients with dementia may be especially useful. Our aim was to compare the NfL measurement performance of two advanced technologies, specifically the Ella™ microfluidic platform and the Lumipulse™ fully automated system, in patients with cognitive disorders.

Methods: Thirty subjects with neurodegenerative cognitive disorders (10 with Alzheimer's Disease, 10 with Frontotemporal Dementia, and 10 with non-progressive Mild Cognitive Impairment) seen at the Cognitive Neurology Clinic of Modena University Hospital (Italy) underwent CSF and serum NfL measurement with both the Ella™ microfluidic platform (Bio-Techne, Minneapolis, MN, USA)) and the Lumipulse™ fully automated system for the CLEIA (Fujirebio Inc., Ghent, Belgium). Correlation and regression analyses were applied to assess the association between NfL concentrations obtained with the two assays in CSF and serum. The Passing-Bablok regression method was employed to evaluate the agreement between the assays.

Results: There were high correlations between the two assays (r = 0.976, 95% CI. 0.950-0.989 for CSF vs. r = 0.923, 95% CI 0.842-0.964 for serum). A Passing-Bablok regression model was estimated to explain the relationship between the two assays, allowing us to switch from one to the other when only one assay was available.

Conclusions: We found a good degree of correlation between the two methods in patients with neurocognitive disorders. We also established a method that will allow comparisons between results obtained with either technique, allowing for meta-analyses and larger sample sizes.

Citing Articles

Exposure to Cadmium and Other Trace Elements Among Individuals with Mild Cognitive Impairment.

Urbano T, Vinceti M, Carbone C, Wise L, Malavolti M, Tondelli M Toxics. 2025; 12(12.

PMID: 39771148 PMC: 11679412. DOI: 10.3390/toxics12120933.

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