Journal of Dental Research, Vol 78, 1704-1710, Copyright © 1999 by International & American Associations for Dental Research Online Journals
Reduced in vivo cell-mediated immune responses to mumps, tuberculin, and streptokinase/streptodornase but not to Candida albicans in oral lichen planus
C. Simark-Mattsson, M. Jontell, G. Bergenholtz and U. I. Dahlgren
Department of Endodontology/Oral Diagnosis, Faculty of Odontology, Goteborg, Sweden.
Oral lichen planus is considered to be a T-cell-mediated disease. The
purpose of this study was to investigate the capacity of T-lymphocytes in
oral lichen planus patients to respond to a number of commonly encountered
environmental antigens in vivo. To do this, we assessed dermal delayed-type
hypersensitivity responses to mumps, streptokinase/streptodornase, Candida
albicans, and purified protein derivative of tuberculin (PPD) in 17 oral
lichen planus patients and in matched controls. Reduced induration in
response toward mumps, PPD, and streptokinase/streptodornase was
demonstrated in oral lichen planus patients compared with controls. In
addition, the total sum of induration diameters was decreased in the
patients. However, C. albicans stimulation resulted in similar levels of
response in both groups. The differences in induration size between matched
patients and controls for mumps and PPD were thus significantly greater
than the corresponding differences for the C. albicans antigen. This
suggests that a selective difference in the response to these antigens
exists in oral lichen planus patients. The results may point to a loss of
memory T-helper function to infrequently encountered environmental
antigens, represented by mumps, PPD, and streptokinase/streptodornase,
contrarily to memory function to common antigens (C. albicans), which seem
to be unaffected.
