[Tuberculous IgE antibodies. Part II. Study of its concentrations in different forms of tuberculosis]

Tuberculosis-afflicted lung are infiltrated by two functionally types of lymphocytes, which presumably counteract with each other by producing proinflammatory (type 1) and anti-inflammatory (type 2) cytokines. It is held that irregular sequestration of antigen into different compartments of the lung may lead to preferential activation of T-helper 1 or T-helper 2 lymphocytes. Unlike IgE antibodies, specific tuberculosis IgE antibodies are seen only in tuberculosis infection. The mean values of IgE antibodies in tuberculosis (7.661 +/- 0.849 IU/ml) are significantly greater than those in other pulmonary diseases (1.768 +/- 0.116 IU/ml). Low concentrations of tuberculosis IgE antibodies in persons with a marked hyperergic response to tuberculin (1.808 +/- 0.097 IU/ml) are of importance. Significant concentrations of mycobacterial IgE antibodies are mainly detected in fibrocavernous (14.56 +/- 1.11 IU/ml), infiltrative (10.10 +/- 1.08 IU/ml), peripheral lymph nodal (10.53 +/- 1.09 IU/ml) tuberculosis rather than intrathoracic lymph nodal tuberculosis (4.555 +/- 0.340 IU/ml). There is a particularly considerable increase in specific IgE antibodies in a phase of decay (15.98 +/- 1.64 IU/ml) and infiltration (12.66 +/- 1.08 IU/ml). These groups also show a concurrent rise in tuberculosis IgG antibodies, which nevertheless disagree with the increase of IgE (the correlation coefficient is 0.599).