Brummel, K. (Koen) (2021) The Role of the Immune System in Endometriosis A Pilot Study: Detecting and distinguishing CD4+ and CD8+ T-lymphocytes in different tissues of women with endometriosis. thesis, Medicine.
Full text available on request.Abstract
Abstract Endometriosis is a gynecological disease affecting between 7-10% of women worldwide and is associated with substantial negative effects on quality of life and a high socio-economic burden. Endometrium-like lesions settle down outside the uterine cavity, proliferating and shedding cyclically. Which leads to complaints of pain, infertility and gastrointestinal/urogenital symptoms. The immune system plays a role in the origination and persistence of the disease by instilling an unsuccessful inflammatory response and facilitating evasion of eradication. In this pilot project, we focused on detection and distinguishing T-lymphocyte subsets in endometriotic tissue, endometrial tissue, peritoneal biopsy, peritoneal fluid, and blood by using monoclonal antibody staining and flow cytometry and assessing the possible correlation of patient factors on the immune environment. The primary goal was to assess the feasibility of our tissue biopsies and protocols. This with the desired result to build a database to perform more research to unravel the role of the immune system in endometriosis. T-lymphocytes were found in all obtained tissue cells, but due to low cell counts in the peritoneal membrane, usage of these biopsies is debatable. We reported a skew to a more cytotoxic favored CD4+/CD8+ ratio in all tissue samples and a high percentage of proliferating regulatory T-lymphocytes in all samples except in blood. This combination might reflect an ineffective immune response. It also shows that the systemic immune environment is not comparable with the local immune microenvironment in women with endometriosis. We confirmed the validity of our protocols and provided several directions for further research on the role of the immune system in endometriosis.
| Item Type: | Thesis (UNSPECIFIED) |
|---|---|
| Supervisor name: | Cantineau, dr. A.E.P. and Tuuk, dr. K. van der |
| Faculty: | Medical Sciences |
| Date Deposited: | 04 Jan 2022 11:10 |
| Last Modified: | 04 Jan 2022 11:10 |
| URI: | https://umcg.studenttheses.ub.rug.nl/id/eprint/2936 |
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