CD45: a critical regulator in immune cells to predict severe and non-severe COVID-19 patients

Area of Science:

• Immunology
• Infectious Diseases
• Biomarkers

Background:

• The COVID-19 pandemic poses a significant global health challenge.
• Early diagnosis is crucial for managing severe cases and improving patient outcomes.
• Understanding host factors influencing disease severity is essential.

Purpose of the Study:

• To identify early diagnostic markers distinguishing severe from non-severe COVID-19 patients.
• To investigate the role of immune cell counts and inflammatory markers in disease severity.
• To assess the potential of CD45 K-values as a predictive biomarker.

Main Methods:

• Analysis of host factors including C-reactive protein (CRP), interleukin (IL) levels, and lymphocyte counts (CD3, CD8, CD45).
• Calculation of K-values for CD45.
• Determination of a cut-off value for CD45 K-values to predict severity.

Main Results:

• Severe COVID-19 patients exhibited higher levels of CRP, IL-1β, hs-CRP, IL-8, and IL-6 compared to non-severe patients.
• Decreased CD3, CD8, and CD45 counts were observed in COVID-19 patients.
• CD45 K-values demonstrated a 100% prediction success rate for differentiating severe and non-severe cases using a cut-off of -94.33.

Conclusions:

• Immune system dysfunction, particularly CD45 deficiency affecting T lymphocytes, is linked to COVID-19 mortality, especially in the elderly.
• CD45 K-values show promise as a sensitive biomarker for early diagnosis and severity prediction in SARS-CoV-2 infection.
• This finding may impact understanding of long-term vaccine effectiveness due to impaired T lymphocyte function.