Role of Inflammatory Cytokines in the Pathogenesis of Bronchial Asthma.

¹Eman Aly Rashwan, ¹Salma Yousry, ¹Abou El-Nazar, ²Nader M Mowafy and ³Mostafa A. Salama.

Departments of ¹Immunology and ²Internal medicine, Medical Research Institute and ³Pediatric department, Faculty of Medicine. Alexandria University, Alexandria, Egypt..

This study aimed to assess the sputum and serum levels of IL-Ib, IL-6, IL-8 and GM-CSF and their role in the pathogenesis of Bronchial asthma. Three groups of children were studied: Group (I) included 15 children with mild asthma, Group (II) 15 children with severe asthma and group (III) 15 healthy control subjects. Increased sputum levels of IL-1b, IL-6 and IL-8 were demonstrated in mild and severe asthmatics (F = 396.85 and 3311.8) while GM-CSF was increased only in Group II (F = 1411.4). on the other hand, serum levels of IL-6 and IL-8 were higher in group I and II while IL-1b and GM-CSF were higher only in group II (F = 366.6 & 313.1). the sputum levels were generally higher than serum levels indicating their local production. Patients with severe asthma (group III) were further subjected to follow-up after one month of alternative day steroid therapy. The after therapy results were lower than pretreatment levels indicating suppression of immune interactions as a mechanism of corticosteroid action in asthma. It is concluded that sputum cytokine analysis is a useful tool to assess the severity of Brachial Asthma and monitor asthmatic patients after treatment.