Cytomegalovirus-specific T-cell immunity to assign the infection status in individuals with passive immunity: a proof of principle.

Serological analysis of the infection status with the human cytomegalovirus (CMV) may be inaccurate after transfusion of blood products due to the variable content of CMV-specific antibodies. In this situation, analysis of cellular immunity may represent a more accurate parameter to assign the individual CMV-infection status. This hypothesis was assessed in a sequence of clinically defined events where a CMV-seronegative patient received human immunoglobulins before AB0 incompatible transplantation of a graft from his CMV-seropositive mother and developed CMV-primary infection thereafter. Humoral immunity was analyzed using ELISA, and CMV-specific CD4 T-cells were flow-cytometrically quantified using intracellular cytokine staining after a 6 h-stimulation with a CMV-antigen lysate. Prior to transplantation, both CMV-specific antibody-titers and T-cell frequencies were below detection limit. After plasma infusion, the patient was temporarily seropositive but remained T-cell negative indicating passive immunity. CMV-specific T-cells became stably detectable after graft-related primary infection, thereby confirming a truly positive infection status. This case provides an instructive proof of principle to show that CMV-specific CD4 T-cells may serve as an accurate marker to define the true CMV-infection status in situations where serological testing is limited by the presence of passively administered antibodies. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Citation

Tina Schmidt, Marion Ritter, Jan Dirks, Barbara C Gärtner, Urban Sester, Martina Sester. Cytomegalovirus-specific T-cell immunity to assign the infection status in individuals with passive immunity: a proof of principle. Journal of clinical virology : the official publication of the Pan American Society for Clinical Virology. 2012 Jul;54(3):272-5

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PMID: 22459003

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