Enzyme Activities in Biopsy Specimens from Large-Bowel Mucosa in Ulcerative Colitis

Abstract
Biopsy specimens from all main segments of the large bowel, obtained from 16 patients with ulcerative colitis, were examined histologically and assayed for a series of organelle marker enzymes. Compared with a control group of 20 subjects, significant dependence on diagnosis was demonstrated for N-acetyl-.beta.-D-glucosaminidase (p < 0.01) and monoamine oxidase (p < 0.05), when dependence on segment was taken into account. Significant correlation with degree of inflammatory cell infiltration was seen in the .gamma.-glutamyltransferase (p < 0.001), 5''-nucleotidase (p < 0.05), and monoamine oxidase (p < 0.0001) activities. Patients with dysplasia had lower activity of N-acetyl-.beta.-D-glucosaminidase (p < 0.05) than those without dysplasia when evaluated by two-way analysis of variance modified for repeated measurements. Multienzyme analysis could distinguish between specimens with dysplasia and aneuploidy and those without when discriminant analyses were used.