Cor Vasa 2004, 45(7):343-345

Apoptosis of peripheral T-lymphocytes during immunosuppression with Neoral or Tacrolimus, and during rejection episodes and their treatment in heart transplant recipients

Jan Hökl^1,*, Jan Černý¹, Petr Němec¹, Pavel Studeník¹, Helena Bedáňová¹, Alžběta Sirotková²

¹ Centrum kardiovaskulární a transplantační chirurgie

² Oddělení patologické anatomie, Fakultní nemocnice u sv. Anny a Masarykova univerzita, Brno, Česká republika

Neoral and Tacrolimus were used as the major immunosuppressive drugs in 18 and 12 adult heart transplant recipients, respectively, included into this study. At 1 month after transplantation, acute rejection episodes were assessed by endomyocardial biopsy and those with grades ³ IB were treated with methylprednisolone or, when steroid-resistant, with ATG or OKT3. Spontaneous in vivo apoptosis of peripheral T-lymphocytes was detected by ELISA using assessment of DNA fragments. In stable patients, there was no significant difference in T-cell apoptosis between Neoral- and Tacrolimus-treated recipients. In patients treated for rejection episodes, T-lymphocyte apoptosis with ATG or OKT3 therapy was significantly higher compared with corticosteroid treatment (p < 0.001).

Keywords: Heart transplantation; Immunosuppression; Acute rejection episode; T-lymphocyte; Apoptosis

Published: July 1, 2004  Show citation