Novel diagnostics and treatment of endometriosis based on protein glycosylation and its association with microbes

Endometriosis is a painful disease affecting women of reproductive age. It is characterized by a tissue, which should be in the uterus, growing outside the uterus. This causes pain, mainly during periods when this tissue should be shed by menstrual blood and leads to internal bleeding. Women with endometriosis can have difficulties in conceiving and/or carrying a pregnancy. The exact cause of this disease is not known. It is often diagnosed late when it has already progressed. Only laparoscopy offers an exact diagnosis. Better, non-invasive diagnosis is needed. Treatment is directed at the symptoms and only works partially or not at all. If we understood the disease better, we could provide significant improvements in treatment and diagnosis and patients would not suffer most of their lives, with pain and fertility problems. We propose to look at the sugars in blood, uterine fluid and tissues taken from endometriosis patients. We will also monitor for hormones, which are known to be dysregulated in endometriosis. Bacterial infection can also occur in women with endometriosis and we aim to investigate if the sugars present on diseased tissue play a role in enabling bacteria to attach to the tissue and establish infection. Sugars that occur in tissue, blood or uterine fluid of patients could be used for diagnosis of disease and identification of sugars that play a role in mediating infection would allow us to develop therapies to block infection and treat disease.