1Departments of ¹Dermatology and ⁴Clinical Pathology, Faculty of Medicine, Al-Azhar University, ²Pathology department, Faculty of Medicine, Assiut University and ³Microbiology department, Faculty of medicine for girls, Al-Azhar² University, Egypt.

This study included twenty one patients suffering from Atopic Dermatitis and ten normal control volunteers. Skin biopsies were assessed histopathologically for the presence of CD1 +ve cells and IgE bearing langerhans cells using immunoperoxidase technique. Serum IgE levels were determined by ELISA technique. Fifteen patients were followed up for two weeks after local treatment with glucocorticoids. Results confirmed the presence of Langerhans cells mainly in the suprabasal layer of the skin and the scarcity of IgE +ve cells in normal subjects. A significant increase in the number of CD1 and IgE +ve cells was noticed in cases of Atopic Dermatitis specially in the dermo-epidermal and the upper dermis. Also showed a significant rise in the serum IgE level of the patients, it was correlated with the disease duration and proportionately increased with the increased number of IgE +ve cells in the skin. Topical treatment with glucocorticoids resulted in reduction of both the CD +ve langerhans cells and the IgE bearing cells as well as lowering of the serum IgE levels. This supports the possible role of L.C. in the pathogenesis of AD and the correlation of the serum level of IgE with the tissue IgE in patients of AD It also indicate that not all the increased CD1 cells are able to express IgE antigenicity , and suggests a possible presence and involvement of different functional subsets of langerhans cells other than the IgE bearing cells in the pathogenesis of Atopic Dermatitis.