Chronic Hepatitis C Infection Has No Effect on Peripheral CD4⁺CD25⁺ Tregulatory Cells in Patients with End-Stage Renal Disease

ABSTRACT

Background: T regulatory cells (Tregs), through variable mechanisms, play a crucial role in Hepatitis C virus (HCV) chronicity and infection tolerance. A great speculation is posed regarding the level, role of Tregs in end-stage renal disease (ESRD), and the presence of associated factors that could influence the Tregs population. Accordingly, we aimed at studying the effect of HCV infection on peripheral CD4⁺CD25⁺Tregs population among patients on hemodialysis (HD) as well as the effect of other comorbidities on these cells.

Patients and methods: A group of 77 patients on HD (32 were HD HCV⁺ and 45 were HD HCV⁻) and 80 healthy controls (HCs) were included in the study. Flow cytometric analysis was performed for identification and quantification of peripheral CD4⁺ CD25⁺Tregs.

Results: The frequency of CD4⁺ CD25⁺Tregs increased significantly in HD patients compared to the HCs (p = <.0001 each). HCV posed no effect on peripheral CD4+ CD25+ Tregs in ESRD patients, when comparing HD HCV- and HD HCV+ groups. In the hypertensive HD HCV-, Tregs percentage was higher than that in the non-hypertensive. However, the difference was not statistically significant. No significant difference was detected between HD HCV- and HD HCV+ patients on the count and percentages of Tregs according to the duration of dialysis.

Conclusion: Demonstrating that chronic HCV infection has no effect on CD4+ CD25+ Tregs cells levels in ESRD patients is of great importance to the success of future allografts in such patients.

KEYWORDS:

• Tregs
• CHC
• ESRD

Authors and Contributors

NAH and EMH have conceived and designed the study. NAH, EMH, TIA, MM and WMA carried out the experiments and collected the data. NAH, EMH, TIA, MMand WMAanalyzed and interpreted the data. NAH, EMH wrote the manuscript. NAH, EMH and MMH critically revised the manuscript.

Conflict of Interest

The authors declare there are no conflicts of interest.

Additional information

Funding

This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.