Spontaneous and PHA stimulated lymphocyte transformation in multiple sclerosis patients during and after acute exacerbations with special reference to steroid therapy.

Spontaneous (SLT) and phytochemagglutinin (PHA) stimulated lymphocyte transformation was studied in multiple sclerosis (MS) patients suffering from acute exacerbations or from the chronic progressive type of MS. The changes in cell-mediated immunity were also observed before, during and after immunosuppressive (prednisone) treatment. A total of 85 venous blood samples from 23 MS patients (11 males, 12 females) were included in the material. The controls consisted of 25 measurements from 17 healthy volunteers who served as normal controls. The pathological controls consisted of 13 patients with neurological diseases other than MS. All these and MS patients were hospitalized. The IUFdR uptake of the cells of MS patients was more rapid than that of the controls at 1-hr incorporation time in SLT. The difference decreased and was eliminated by longer incubation times (2-4 hrs). MS patients also differed from pathological controls in this sense. The reaction to PHA stimulation was lower both in the MS groups (64 per cent from the normal controls) and in the pathological controls. Within the different MS groups, significantly lower values were seen only in the samples of the patients receiving immunosuppressive therapy. Under prednisone (80-100 mg initial dosis) PHA stimulation values rapidly dropped within the first week and slowly returned within 2-4 weeks after the stopping of the corticosteroid treatment. In some cases, however, PHA values remained at a low level for several months. The significance of this finding for the understanding of the underlying pathogenetic mechanisms has to be studied in more detail.