Distal symmetric polyneuropathy (DSPN) remains one of the most common chronic complications of type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) and contributes substantially to morbidity and impaired quality of life. Findings presented at the ADA Scientific Sessions 2026 evaluated whether serum neuroglobin levels are associated with DSPN in patients with T2DM and explored its potential utility as a biomarker for diabetic neuropathy.

This cross-sectional study included 170 individuals comprising 55 healthy controls, 58 patients with T2D without neuropathy, and 57 patients with T2DM and DSPN. DSPN was evaluated using clinical assessment and nerve conduction studies. Serum neuroglobin levels were measured using enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA). Logistic regression analysis assessed associations between neuroglobin levels and DSPN, while receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis evaluated discriminatory performance.

Findings

• Serum neuroglobin levels showed a significant stepwise decline across study groups, decreasing from healthy controls to patients with T2DM and DSPN (54.02 vs 37.65 vs 27.86 ng/mL; P<0.001).
• Lower serum neuroglobin levels remained independently associated with DSPN in multivariable logistic regression analysis (odds ratio [OR] 0.954; 95% CI 0.922-0.987; P=0.006).
• ROC analysis showed that neuroglobin differentiated patients with T2D and DSPN from those without neuropathy with an area under the curve (AUC) of 0.784.
• A neuroglobin cut-off value of 32.27 ng/mL showed sensitivity of 73.7% and specificity of 72.4% for identifying DSPN.

This analysis showed that lower serum neuroglobin levels were independently associated with DSPN in patients with T2DM. Neuroglobin demonstrated moderate discriminatory performance for identifying neuropathy and may support future biomarker-based risk assessment strategies in diabetic neuropathy.