T-Cell Response in Dermatitis Herpetiformis: May Epidermal Transglutaminase Play a Role in Predicting Clinical Relapse?

Abstract

We read with interest the paper by Kalliokoski et al. (2020) investigating whether PBMCs collected from patients with dermatitis herpetiformis (DH) undergoing a 3-day oral gluten challenge react to gluten-derived gliadin in the enzyme-linked immunospot (ELISpot) assay similarly to those from patients with celiac disease (CD). Interestingly, the authors found that on stimulation with tissue transglutaminase (TG)-gliadin or either of the gliadin peptides, 7 of the 15 patients (47%) with DH and 15 of the 18 patients (83%) with CD were considered responders in the IFN-γ ELISpot assay.