Avaliação da resposta imune e frequência do polimorfismo de TNF- α- 308 em pacientes com hepatite c

Abstract

Introduction: Hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection is the major cause of liver disease worldwide. Approximately 170 million more people are infected with the virus . The immune response against HCV leads to secretion of cytokines and activation and proliferation of effector T cells to act in infected hepatocytes and thus initiate the inflammatory process in the liver. Objective: This study aimed to characterize the immune response and to estimate the frequency of polymorphism of TNF - α -308 G / A in patients with chronic hepatitis C treated at the Tropical Medicine Foundation Dr. Heitor Vieira Dourado. Material and Methods: In this study we used samples from 30 patients with hepatitis C virus infection and 28 samples from individuals not infected with HCV . The analysis of T lymphocyte and adhesion molecules were performed by flow cytometry. The cytokine levels were assessed by flow cytometry using the CBA kit. The characterization of TNF- α -308 polymorphism was obtained by PCR-RFLP. The fibrosis was determined after histological analysis of liver biopsy according to the METAVIR score. Results: Our data revealed that percentage of regulatory T lymphocytes (T regs) and cytokines are increased in patients with hepatitis C when compared to the control group. Patients with fibrosis ≥F3 (N = 10) was characterized relevant frequency ( 100%) of individuals with high production of IL-2 and low frequency (50%) of individuals with high production of IL-10 and patients with fibrosis ≤F2 was characterized relevant frequency ( 85%) of individuals with high production of IL-4 and frequency ( 55%) of individuals with high production of IL-10. Conclusion: The effector T cells are regulated by T lymphocytes regs. In the fibrosis ≥F3 was characterized Th1 cytokine profile while in fibrosis ≤F2 ws characterized TH2 cytokine profile. The low IL-10 production was associated an increased fibrogenic activity in patients with hepatitis C.