TY - JOUR JO - Central European Journal of Immunology SN - 1426-3912 VL - 39 IS - 2 PY - 2014 ID - Nájera-Medina2014 TI - Clinical immunologyCytokine patterns in paediatric patients presenting serious gastrointestinal and respiratory bacterial infections AB - In the adaptive immune response, the types of cytokines produced define whether there is a cellular (T1) or a humoral (T2) response. Specifically, in the T1 response, interleukin 2 (IL-2), interferon  (IFN-) and tumor necrosis factor β (TNF-β) are produced, whereas in the T2 response, IL-4, IL-5, IL-6, IL-10 and IL-13 are primarily produced. Cytokines are primarily involved in the regulation of immune system cells. The aim of the present study was to evaluate the cytokine patterns (Type 1/Type 2) and TNF- expression levels in children with severe gastrointestinal and respiratory bacterial infections. The enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) technique was used to identify the cytokines and the infectious agents. The results obtained demonstrated that, in general, children with bacterial infections experienced an increase in IL-2, IFN- and IL-4 concentrations and a decrease in TNF-, IL-5 and IL-6 concentrations when compared to healthy children. Specifically, type 1 cytokines and an increased TNF- concentration were found in children with gastrointestinal infections. However, patients with respiratory infections showed increased concentrations of both T2 (IL-4, IL-6 and IL-10) and T1 (IL-2 and IFN-) components. Thus, it was concluded that children with gastrointestinal infections exclusively developed a T1 response, whereas children with respiratory infections developed a T1/T2 response to fight the infection. AU - Nájera-Medina, Oralia AU - Palacios-Martínez, Monika AU - Rodríguez-Cruz, Leonor AU - Carmen Cortés-Bejar, Consuelo del AU - Valencia-Chavarría, Fernando AU - Martínez-Gómez, Daniel AU - González-Torres, María Cristina SP - 223 EP - 227 DA - 2014 DO - 10.5114/ceji.2014.43727 UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.5114/ceji.2014.43727 ER -