Influence of Bacterial Superantigen TSST-1 Against the Anti-Proliferative Efficacy of Immunosuppressive Drugs and Interleukin 2 Production in Peripheral Blood Mononuclear Cells of Hemodialysis Patients and Healthy Subjects

Abstract

We investigated the influence of bacterial superantigen on the efficacies of immunosuppressive drugs on the blastogenesis of peripheral-blood mononuclear cells of 27 hemodialysis patients awaiting renal transplantation. The IC50 values for prednisolone, methylprednisolone, cyclosporine, and tacrolimus evaluated in the superantigen-stimulated cells were significantly higher than those evaluated in concanavalin A-stimulated cells (p = 0.0002–0.018). Interleukin-2 amounts produced from superantigen-stimulated cells were significantly larger than those from concanavalin A-stimulated cells (p = 0.0363). These results suggest that superantigen attenuates the suppressive efficacies of glucocorticoids and calcineurin inhibitors by stimulating lymphocytes of hemodialysis patients awaiting transplantation to overproduce interleukin-2.