Regulatory natural killer cell expression in atopic childhood asthma

Introduction: Different subsets of natural killer [NK] cells were found to play a role in pathogenesis of allergy. We sought to investigate the expression of regulatory NK cells [CD56+CD16+CD158+] in atopic children with bronchial asthma in order to outline the value of these cells as biomarkers of disease severity and/or control

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Methods: A cross sectional controlled study was carried out in the Pediatric Allergy and Immunology Unit, Ain Shams University. The study included 45 atopic children [mean age[SD]= [2.9] years] with bronchial asthma [BA] and/or allergic rhinitis [AR]as well as 40 healthy matched controls. Enrolled subjects underwent complete blood counting and flow cytometric measurement of NK cell [CD16+ CD56+] and regulatory NK cells [CD16+CD56+CD158+]

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Results: Patients had significantly higher regulatory NK cell percentages [mean [SD]= 41 [52] %] than controls [mean [SD]=15 [7.1]]; p Conclusions: Regulatory NK cells seem to be increased in childhood asthma. We recommend wider scale prospective studies on steroid-naive subjects involving measurement of cytokines that are secreted by different types of NK cells