In vitro inhibitory effect of artesunate on the vascular endothelial growth factor secreted by mononuclear cells in hand-foot-and-mouth disease children complicated with encephalitis

Abstract

Objective To investigate the dynamics of white blood cell count (WBC), prealbumin (PA), high sensitive C-reactive protein (hs-CRP), and vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) in hand-foot-and-mouth disease (HFMD) complicated with or without encephalitis and in vitro inhibitory effects of artesunate on VEGF secretion of mononuclear cells from HFMD patients. Methods Peripheral blood mononuclear cells from healthy control group, HFMD group and HFMD combined with encephalitis group were isolated by Ficoll density gradient centrifugation and treated with different concentrations of artesunate (25, 50, 100 mg/L). The expression of VEGF in the supernatant was examined by ELISA double antibody sandwich method. The levels of WBC, PA and hs-CRP in the three groups were also detected. Multiple samples were compared by one-way analysis of variance. Multiple comparison was performed by Dunnett T3 test. Correlation of two variables was analyzed by Spearman correlation test. Results There were significant differences in the levels of WBC, hs-CRP, PA and VEGF between the HFMD combined with or without encephalitis group and health control group (F=172.69, 366.02, 166.32 and 5 941.89, respectively, all P<0.01). There were significant differences in the levels of VEGF secreted by mononuclear cells treated with three different concentrations of artesunate between the HFMD combined with or without encephalitis groups and health control group (F=194.265 and 4 750.69, respectively, both P<0.01). Correlation analysis showed that the VEGF level secretion by mononuclear cells from HFMD patients with or without encephalitis were both negatively correlated with different concentrations of artesunate (r=-0.903 and -0.969, both P<0.01). Conclusions Compared with HFMD without encephalitis, the secretion of VEGF by mononuclear cells, WBC and hs-CRP levels in HFMD complicated with encephalitis group all increase and PA decrease significantly. Artesunate can inhibit the secretion of VEGF by mononuclear cells of patients with hand-foot-and-mouth disease in a dose-dependent manner in vitro. Key words: Hand, foot and mouth disease; Encephalitis; Artesunate; Vascular endothelial growth factors