RESUMO
By animal experiments in rat, it has been known that Interleukin-6 (IL-6) is secreted from renal mesangial celle and is an autocrine growth factor for the proliferation of mesangial cells. According to these facts, several studies have been tried for its clinical usefulness by measuring their serum or urinary IL-6 in glomerulonephritis patients with mesangial proliferation. The authors measured urinary IL-6 levels by Interleukin-6 [123I] RIA kit (Amersham Co. UK) in 11 patients with minimal change nephrotic syndrome, in 3 patients with mesangial proliferative glomerulonephritis (MesPGN), in 3 patients with IgA nephropathy, in 9 patients with Henoch-Schonlein purpura nephritis (HSPN) in 2 patients with membranoproliferative glomerulonephritis (MPGN), and in 12 normal healthy children as a control group. The results obtained were summarized as follows: 1) There was no significant differences of urinary IL-6 levels between minimal change nephrotic syndrome patient group and normal control group (p=0.73). The level of urinary IL-6 was increased significantly in HSPN group compared to in normal control group, statistically (p=0.045). Also there were same results in the glomerulonephritis patients with mesangial proliferation in its histopathologic findings such as IgA nephropathy, MesPGN, MPGN. 2) There was a positive correlation between the degree of mesangial proliferation and the urinary IL-6 level. In conclusion, the urinary IL-6 level reflects the glomerular mesangial proliferation and could be useful as a predictive indicator for evaluation of its clinical course in patient with mesangial proliferative glomerulonephritis.
