A calf thymus acid lysate improves clinical symptoms and T-cell defects in the early stages of HIV infection: second report.

Thymomodulin is a calf thymus acid lysate capable of inducing T lymphocyte maturation. Fifteen patients with HIV infection at different stages according to the Walter Reed classification were treated with 60 mg/day of thymomodulin syrup for more than 50 days. Two WR6B subjects had clinical and immunological parameters unchanged and died, while the patient suffering from Kaposi's sarcoma presented an evident clinical and laboratory improvement with remission of the neoplasia. The other 12 patients ranging from WR2 to WR5B showed an improvement of clinical symptoms after thymomodulin therapy accompanied by the normalization of CD4/CD8 ratio (P less than 0.001). This helpers/suppressors increase was due to a significant increase of CD4 cells (P less than 0.01) and also to a decrease of the CD8 lymphocytes (P less than 0.05). Thymomodulin administration did not cause an enhancement of the urinary levels of neopterin, a marker of T-cell activation.