[Immunologic function of the tonsils in relation to immune competent T and B cells in children]

The authors introduced a E and EAC rosette-forming cell technique with semiquantitative evaluation of T and B lymphocytes in the peripheral blood of 56 healthy persons of both sexes and of different ages. The percentages of T and B lymphocytes in the peripheral blood and tonsils of 31 children was also calculated. The percentage of rosette forming cells in E and EAC suspensions appeared to be independent of age and sex. The percentage of T lymphocytes in the peripheral blood is significantly higher than in the tonsils, whereas the percentage of B lymphocytes is significantly higher in the tonsils than in the peripheral blood. The percentage of T lymphocytes was found to be significantly higher in hypertrophic as the mean percentage of T lymphocytes in tonsils of 31 children. Also in tonsils with adhesions there was a statistically significant higher percentage of EAC rosettes than in tonsils free of adhesions.