Advancing Miscarriage Prediction and Diagnosis by Blood Level of Soluble PD-L1

Overview

A novel method for early prediction and diagnosis of miscarriage by quantifying soluble programmed cell death ligand-1 (sPD-L1) levels in blood. This approach provides a reliable, non-invasive biomarker to identify women at risk of miscarriage early in pregnancy, applicable to both natural and IVF pregnancies, enabling timely intervention to improve pregnancy outcomes.

  • Advancing Miscarriage Prediction and Diagnosis by Blood Level of Soluble PD-L1
Technical name of innovation
Methods for Diagnosing and Predicting Miscarriage by Soluble PD-L1 Quantification
Research completion
2023
Problem addressed

Current miscarriage diagnosis methods lack specificity, reliability, and predictive power. Traditional markers (β-hCG, progesterone, ultrasound) are limited in sensitivity and only identify miscarriage retrospectively or at advanced stages. There is an urgent unmet need for an accurate, early, and predictive biomarker that enables effective clinical intervention to reduce miscarriage rates.

Innovation
  • Soluble PD-L1 as Biomarker: Establishes sPD-L1 as a predictive biomarker; decreased serum sPD-L1 levels correlate strongly with increased miscarriage risk in early pregnancy stages.
  • High Diagnostic Accuracy: Demonstrated exceptional diagnostic performance (AUROC up to 0.91) with validated cutoff values for clinical application.
  • Applicability Across Pregnancy Types: Effective for both naturally conceived and IVF pregnancies, facilitating broad clinical applicability.
Key impact
  • This innovation introduces a novel biomarker-based approach for early prediction of miscarriage, significantly advancing current clinical practices by enabling proactive management and timely intervention.
  • It provides superior diagnostic sensitivity and specificity compared to traditional methods, ensuring more accurate clinical assessments and reducing the likelihood of diagnostic uncertainty in early pregnancy.
  • By enabling early identification of miscarriage risk, it substantially alleviates psychological distress and anxiety experienced by pregnant women, offering clarity and improving patient care.
  • The method facilitates personalized medical interventions based on individual miscarriage risks, thus potentially reducing miscarriage incidence, enhancing patient outcomes, and decreasing overall healthcare costs.
Award
  • Gold Medal at the 2024 Geneva International Invention Awards
Application
  • Clinical miscarriage prediction and diagnosis
  • Early pregnancy screening
  • Monitoring IVF pregnancy viability
  • Personalized therapeutic intervention in early gestation

Patent

  • US Patent Serial No. 63/518,903
The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK)

Founded in 1963, The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) is a forward-looking comprehensive research university with a global vision and a mission to combine tradition with modernity, and to bring together China and the West. CUHK teachers and students hail from all around the world. Four Nobel laureates are associated with the university, and it is the only tertiary institution in Hong Kong with recipients of the Nobel Prize, Turing Award, Fields Medal and Veblen Prize sitting as faculty in residence. CUHK graduates are connected worldwide through an extensive alumni network. CUHK undertakes a wide range of research programmes in many subject areas, and strives to provide scope for all academic staff to undertake consultancy and collaborative projects with industry. 

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