IMMUNE DEFICIENCY SYNDROMES AS MODELS FOR STUDY
OF IMMUNE DEFENSES AGAINST INFECTIONS IN HUMANS
Most of our information about the immune system
in humans has been learned from the study of patients with immunodeficiency
diseases . The most characteris-tic clinical feature of immunocompromised
patients are the repeated or chronic infections, often caused by opportunistic
agents. Some characteristic associations between specific types of infections
and generic types of immune deficiency provide the best glimpse of the
physiological role of the different components of the immune system:
1.
Patients
with antibody deficiencies and conserved cell-mediated immunity suffer from
repeated and chronic infections with pyogenic bacteria.
2.
Patients
with primary deficiencies of cell-mediated immunity usually suffer from chronic
or recurrent fungal, parasitic, and viral infections.
3.
Neutrophil
deficiencies are usually associated with bacterial infections caused by common
organisms of low virulence, usually kept in check through nonim-mune
phagocytosis.
4.
Isolated
complement component deficiencies are also associated with bacterial
in-fections, most frequently involving Neisseria
gonorrhoeae and Neisseriameningitidis,
whose elimination appears to require the activation of the mem-brane attack
complex.
Related Topics
Privacy Policy, Terms and Conditions, DMCA Policy and Compliant
Copyright © 2018-2024 BrainKart.com; All Rights Reserved. Developed by Therithal info, Chennai.