A Comparison of Epstein‐barr Virus‐specific T‐cell Immunity in Rheumatoid Arthritis and Osteoarthritis Patients

Abstract

Summary The level of Epstein‐Barr virus (EBV)‐specific T‐cell‐mediated immunity in 20 rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients was compared with 16 age‐and sex‐matched osteoarthritis (OA) patients using the regression of EBV‐transformation assay. The results show that the level of EBV‐specific T‐cell immunity in RA patients is significantly depressed compared with OA patients (P<.001) or healthy laboratory controls (P<.001). In contrast, lymphocytes from RA and OA patients showed a similar ability to act as a responder population in the mixed leucocyte reaction. It is unlikely that the difference in EBV‐specific immunity is due to a general T‐cell defect in RA patients since there was no correlation between EBV‐specific T‐cell immunity and mixed leucocyte reactivity. There was no correlation between EBV‐specific T‐cell immunity and any of the indicators of disease activity nor was there any difference in the anti‐EBV antibody titre between both groups of patients. These results indicate that RA patients are deficient in the EBV‐specific cytotoxic T‐cell precursor population and may explain some of the reported observations of the involvement of EBV in this disease.

Identification of multiple Epstein-Barr virus-induced nuclear antigens with sera from patients with rheumatoid arthritis

“…The EBV titers of the sera collected from clinically normal individuals and patients diagnosed as having rheumatoid arthritis are shown in Table 2. The criteria used for diagnosing patients with rheumatoid arthritis are presented in a previous study (16). Anti-EBNA titers were measured according to the method of Reedman and Klein (21).…”

Immune regulation of Epstein-Barr virus (EBV): EBV nuclear antigen as a target for EBV-specific T cell lysis

“…This CTL response is predominately CD8, class I restricted [31], although CD4, class II restricted CTLs have also been described [21,24]. In pathological conditions associated which immunosuppression, the frequency of these EBV-specific CTL precursors is reduced and there is an associated increase in the number of EBV-infected B lymphocytes carried in vivo [17,23,46].…”

How Rheumatoid Arthritis Can Result from Provocation of the Immune System by Microorganisms and Viruses

“…The population of the virus specific CD8+ T-lymphocytes and their cytotoxic activity focused on infected cells or the separate Herpesviridae peptide epitopes is decreased both in the early and late stage RA in contrast to an abundant and hyperactivated whole population of CD8+ T cells of various specificities ( Moss et al, 1983 ; Gaston et al, 1986 ; Toussirot et al, 2000 ; Shimojima et al, 2008 ; Carvalheiro et al, 2015 ).…”