Depressed NK cell activity of peripheral blood mononuclear cells in untreated Hodgkin's disease: Enhancing effect of interferon in vitro

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Abstract
Natural killer (NK) cell activity of unseparated peripheral blood mononuclear cells from 30 untreated patients with Hodgkin's disease and 22 age‐ and sex‐matched normal controls was evaluated using the classical K 562 cells as targets. A significant defect was demonstrated in the patients with stage I‐II and seemed to be more profound in patients with advanced disease (stage III‐IV) and in those with B symptoms. The differences between subgroups of patients, however, were not statistically significant, mostly because of the wide dispersion of individual data. Pre‐incubation of effector cells with alpha A leucocyte recombinant interferon led to a clear increase in NK cell activity in 4 of 6 patients tested, showing that depressed NK activity in Hodgkin's disease is still susceptible to the enhancing effect of interferon, at least in some patients.—