Elevated levels of serum soluble E-selectin in patients with chronic hepatitis B: Correlation with T lymphocyte subsets, NK cells and liver inflammation

Background

It has been reported that serum soluble E-selectin (sE-selectin) may be increased in some inflammatory liver diseases. The purpose of our study was to investigate changes of sE-selectin, T lymphocyte subsets, natural killer (NK) cells, and HBV load in patients with chronic hepatitis B (CHB), analyze the relationship between them, and discuss their significances.

Methods

Fifty-four patients with chronic hepatitis B and fourteen controls were studied. Serum sE-selectin, T lymphocyte subsets, NK cells, and hepatitis B virus (HBV) load were detected by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA), flow cytometry (FCM), and fluorescence quantitative polymerase chain reaction (FQ-PCR), respectively.

Results

sE-selectin level in patients with CHB increased significantly than that in controls (p < 0.01). The percentages of CD4 positive cells and NK cells decreased while the percentage of CD8 positive cells increased significantly in CHB patients than in controls (p < 0.01, respectively). sE-selectin level significantly related to levels of T lymphocyte subsets, NK cells, serum alanine aminotransferase (sALT) and aspartate aminotransferase (sAST) (p < 0.01, respectively), but had no relationship with HBV level.

Conclusion

The sE-selectin levels in patients with chronic hepatitis B increase significantly and correlate to liver inflammation, suggesting that sE-selectin can be considered as an additional useful marker of CHB inflammatory activity, and E-selectin may play part of role in pathogenesis of chronic hepatitis B.