Acute pancreatitis in aging animals: Loss of pancreatitis-associated protein protection?

Table 1 Effect of age on biochemical markers of sodium taurocholate pancreatitis

	Young rats	Old rats
Amylase (μg/L)	12 536 ± 6141	5941 ± 1162
Lipase (μg/L)	1288 ± 755	682 ± 194
MPO (ng/mL)	1962 ± 538	2066 ± 1219
MCP-1 (pg/mL)	4312 ± 350	4730 ± 376
CRP (mg/dL)	0.25 ± 0.04	0.61 ± 0.19

All serum levels were higher than sham and unoperated controls. No differences were seen between young and old animals. However, subgroup analysis of CRP levels revealed that the most-aged subgroup (c) had significantly higher levels (Figure 3). MPO: Myeloperoxidase; MCP-1: Monocyte chemotactic protein-1; CRP: C-reactive protein.

Table 2 Effect of age on pancreatic Reg1 and pancreatitis-associated protein mRNA levels

	Young rats	Old rats
Reg1	0.727 ± 0.19	1.27 ± 0.22
PAP1	119 ± 46	116 ± 18
PAP2	690 ± 267	475 ± 142
PAP3	57.8 ± 19	26.4 ± 4.3a

Real time polymerase chain reaction analysis of RNA isolated from pancreata from young and old rats 24 h after induction of pancreatitis by sodium taurocholate. All were done against a β-actin control. No difference in RNAs were found except for pancreatitis-associated protein (PAP)3 (^aP < 0.05, Mann Whitney U test).