Simple diagnosis of graft-versus-host disease.
BACKGROUND
Among patients undergoing allogeneic bone marrow transplantation, we previously detected an increase of CD8+S6F1+ and CD8+CD57- cells with the onset of acute graft-versus-host disease.


OBJECTIVE
This study was an attempt to develop a simple laboratory test for graft-versus-host disease.


METHODS
We analyzed the percentage of the two lymphocyte subsets in the peripheral blood mononuclear cells of healthy volunteers, patients with posttransfusion graft-versus-host disease, and recipients of allogeneic bone marrow transplants.


RESULTS
Two patients with posttransfusion graft-versus-host disease showed a high percentage of both subsets. When the graft-versus-host disease pattern was defined as 45% or more CD8+S6F1+ cells and 35% or more CD8+CD57- cells, it was found in none of 17 recipients without acute graft-versus-host disease, 9 of 16 recipients with grade I disease, and 8 of 9 recipients with grade II or worse disease had this pattern.


CONCLUSIONS
Our test may be useful for the laboratory diagnosis of acute graft-versus-host disease.
Hiraoka
A
A
Osaka Medical Center for Cancer and Cardiovascular Diseases, Japan.
Kawakami
M
M
Fukuda
H
H
Nakamura
H
H
Karasuno
T
T
Teshima
H
H
Masaoka
T
T
D000208:Acute Disease; D000328:Adult; D016026:Bone Marrow Transplantation / Q000276:immunology; D018959:CD57 Antigens / Q000032:analysis; D018414:CD8-Positive T-Lymphocytes; D005434:Flow Cytometry; D006086:Graft vs Host Disease / Q000175:diagnosis*; D006801:Humans; D008213:Lymphocyte Activation; D016176:T-Lymphocyte Subsets
D018959:CD57 Antigens