Study of Regulatory T cells in Patients with Crohn Disease

Background and Crohn disease (CD) is an autoimmune disorder in which a failure of tolerance to the intestinal antigens plays a pivotal role in the pathogenesis of this disease. Treg cells control immune responses to self and foreign antigens and have an important role in maintaining self-tolerance. In this study we evaluated the frequency of Tregs in the peripheral blood of patients with Crohn disease compared with healthy control group. In a case-control study, 18 patients with Crohn disease and 20 healthy volunteers were enrolled. Blood sampling was done in both patients and controls and peripheral blood mononuclear cells were isolated. Then, the frrequency of CD4+CD25+FoxP3+CD127low/– Tregs and CD4+CD25+FoxP3– activated effector T cells were evaluated by flow cytometry. Data analysis was performed in GraphPad Prism and SPSS. The results showed that the frequency of Treg cells in the peripheral blood of CD patients was significantly lower compared to that of the healthy controls. In addition, a significant decrease in Treg/activated effector T cells ratio was observed in CD patients compared to controls. The results showed that Crohn disease is associated with a decrease in the peripheral blood Tregs pool. Moreover, it seems that the balance between Tregs and effector T cells is disturbed in CD patients.