The agammaglobulinemia subjects perceived a lower global quality of life than the healthy subjects, but significantly higher than the rheumatic diseases controls. The clinical relevance of health-related quality of life assessment in X-linked agammaglobulinemia pediatric patients is discussed.
SUMMARY Lymphocyte subpopulations were studied in 20 hypertransfused patients with ,B-thalassaemia major, some of whom had been splenectomised. B-lymphocytes were normal but T-lymphocytes were decreased in all patients. The T-cell count was lower in the splenectomised patients than in the nonsplenectomised ones. In the former, the active rosette-forming lymphocytes were also diminished, but the difference was not significant. In all patients the percentage of null cells was greater and the activity of K-cells increased compared with controls.
The variation of natural killer (NK) cell activity and lymphocyte subsets 20 h after a single test dose of α-IFN, was studied in 17 thalassemic patients with chronic hepatitis C. All patients had suspended the α-IFN therapy at least 12 months before the study: 10 were considered responders and 7 nonresponders. Also NK cell cytotoxicity after in vitro incubation with α-IFN was studied. The administration of a single dose of α-IFN increased NK cell cytotoxic activity significantly in the group of responders and in non-responders; moreover the NK cell cytotoxic activity after α-IFN in vitro incubation increased both in responders and nonresponders, but to a lesser degree than in healthy controls. Absolute values of CD4+ and CD8+ lymphocytes decreased significantly only in responders. In conclusion, our data suggest that the variation of NK cytotoxic activity and lymphocyte subsets after a test dose of α-IFN can be considered a parameter related to IFN biological effects.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.