Peripheral blood mucosa-associated constant T cell expression in children with bronchial asthma and its relevance to severity / 中国医师进修杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective@#To investigate the peripheral blood mucosa-associated constant T cell(MAIT) expression in children with bronchial asthma and its relevance to severity.@*Methods@#Ninety-eight children with bronchial asthma who were treated in Affliated Dongfeng Hospital from May 2016 to May 2019 were selected as the asthma group. Another 60 healthy children who underwent health checkup during the same period were as control group. The levels of MAIT were detected by flow cytometry analyzer using BD FACSAria II flow cytometry, and the lung function was detected by Yage lung function tester. The receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve was used to evaluate the diagnostic efficacy of peripheral blood MAIT for bronchial asthma. Pearson analysis was used to examine the relationship between MAIT cells and pulmonary function.@*Results@#There were no significant differences in the general data of gender, age, and body mass index between the two groups (P>0.05). The asthma control test (ACT) score, the percentage of first second forced expiratory volume occupied estimated value (FEV1%), the percentage of first second forced expiratory volume occupied forced vital capacity (FEV1/FVC), the percentage of peak expiratory flowoccupied estimated value (PEF), and MAIT cells in asthma group were significantly lower than those in control group (P<0.05). Serum MAIT identified bronchial asthma and healthy controls with an area under curve (AUC) of 0.900, with a sensitivity of 82.65%, and a specificity of 85.00%. Serum MAIT identified the mild-sustained group and the healthy control group with an AUC of 0.910, with a sensitivity of 94.64%, and a specificity of 81.67%. Correlation analysis showed that MAIT cells in children with bronchial asthma were significantly positively correlated with pulmonary function indexes such as FEV1%, FEV1/FVC and PEF (r=0.159, 0.222, 0.213, P<0.05).@*Conclusions@#The peripheral blood MAIT in children with bronchial asthma is significantly reduced, which is related to the levels of lung function indicators. MAIT can be used as one of the indicators for the diagnosis and clinical prognosis of patients with bronchial asthma.