PROFILE OF IMMUNE RESPONSIVENESS IN MULTIPLE-SCLEROSIS

Google Scholar
  • 1 January 1978
    • journal article
    • research article
    • Vol. 31  (2) , 141-149
Abstract
An immunological profile of various indices of B [bone marrow-derived] cell function and T [thymus-derived] cell function was developed for the ''early'' case of multiple sclerosis (MS). This was compared against 2 groups of controls comprising age and sex-matched healthy subjects, and patients with other disabling neurological diseases (CNS controls) who were matched for age, sex and type and duration of disability. Some indices of humoral immune responsiveness, such as the induced primary response to monomeric flagellin and the ''resting'' levels of antibody to measles and rubella viruses, showed significant augmentation. Cellular immune deficits were attributed to an illness effect per se for the following reasons: cell-mediated immunity was depressed, but only when compared with that of healthy subjects and not when compared with that of the CNS controls; and transformation responses of lymphocytes to viral antigens were inversely related to disability status. The abnormalities in humoral immune responses demonstrable in this study do not provide an explanation for this disease; if there is a relevant ''immunological fault'', the nature of this needs to be sought from within the neuraxis rather than from the systemic circulation.