The cytokines of helper T cells in Patients with immune Thrombocytopenic Purpura

Abstract 4663

Immune thrombocytopenic purpura (ITP) is traditionally considered an auto-antibody mediated disease. Recently the role of T cell immunity in ITP has been recognized and discussed by various researchers. In order to investigate changes in T cell subgrouping of ITP patients, we enrolled 20 previously untreated ITP patients (8 males, 12 females) with a median age of 41 (range: 20 to 81) and 20 normal controls. After standard dose of prednisone treatments (1mg·kg^-1·d^-1), 12 patients achieved complete remission and 7 partial remission. Using real-time RT-PCR methods, we measured the expression of 7 T cell associated genes including T-bet, IFN-γ, GATA-3, TGF-β, Foxp3, IL-2, IL-4 in PBMC of ITP patients before and after treatment and of normal controls. The results showed that T-bet, IFN-γ and IL-2 were significantly over-expressed in ITP patients (p<0.001), which represented a Th1 up-regulation. After treatment, T-bet, IFN-γ, IL-2 and IL-4 were markedly down-regulated, while Foxp3 were up-regulated (p<0.05). Interestingly, TGF-β showed a different pattern between old and young patients. It was down-regulated (p<0.05) among patients younger than 60, while up-regulated in older patients. In conclusion, we found significant change of T cell associated gene expression in ITP patients. And standard dose of prednisone treatment could effectively tune T cell subgroups to a suppressive pattern.