Cytokines and cytokine therapy in gastrointestinal diseases

Abstract

Aim. To compare cytokine status in gastrointestinal diseases (GID) with reference to etiological factor, course, stage, therapy of the disease. Material and methods. Enzyme immunoassay was used to examine cytokines in the peripheral blood, tissue homogenates of 560 GID patients. GID were represented by ulcer disease (UD), cholelithiasis, chronic hepatitis (CH), glutenic enteropathy (GE), Crohn's disease (CD), nonspecific ulcer colitis (NUC). Results. In chronic recurrent GID (UD, cholelithiasis, GE) early exacerbation was characterized by elevated concentrations of IL-ip, IL-6, IL-8. Concentrations of IL-12, Infa,g, TNFa reached maximum on the height of the disease. Intensification of regenerative processes raised concentrations of IL4, IL-10. An overall level of serum cytokines averaged 190-780 pg/ml, reaching in some patients with active disease 1200-3000 pg/ml, in remission 30-110 pg/ml, in the control 40 pg/ml. In chronic progressive GID the levels of IL-10, IL-2, IL-8, IL-6 reached 30-80 pg/ml, IL-12, Infy, TNFa 150-370 pg/ml. A rise in cytokines concentrations in inflammatory viral, bacterial, autoimmune GID was higher than in cancer, alcoholism-related diseases, metabolic disturbances. Basic therapy in patients with chronic recurrent GID led to a significant fall in concentration of serum cytokines. Therapy with monoclonal antibodies to TNFa was associated with transitory pronounced favourable changes in peripheral blood cytokine status. Conclusion. GID provoke elevation of serum and tissue cytokines, impairment of cytokine balance in correlation with the etiological factor, variants of the course, stage of the disease, on-going therapy.

Keywords

• cytokines
• cytokine status
• interleukins
• chronic recurrent and chronic progressive gastrointestinal diseases
• cytokine therapy