Feryal Dabagh-Gorjani; Fahimeh Anvari; Jaleh Zolghadri; Eskandar KamaliSarvestani; Behrouz Gharesi-Fard
Volume 11, Issue 4 , December 2014, , Pages 233-245
Abstract
Background: Preeclampsia (PE) is one of the most complex and life-threatening pregnancy disorders and is considered as a major cause of mortality among mothers and fetuses worldwide. Although the exact etiology of PE is not well known several lines of evidence support an immunological etiology for PE. ...
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Background: Preeclampsia (PE) is one of the most complex and life-threatening pregnancy disorders and is considered as a major cause of mortality among mothers and fetuses worldwide. Although the exact etiology of PE is not well known several lines of evidence support an immunological etiology for PE. Objective: To investigate the differences in the expression of TLRs 2, 4, 5, and 6 and a group of inflammatory cytokines including IL-1, IL-6, TNF-α and IFN-γ in placentas from PE and healthy pregnant women in their third trimester of pregnancy. Methods: This case-control study was performed on fifteen PE and fifteen age and gestational matched healthy pregnant women in the third trimester of pregnancy. Real time PCR (RT-PCR) technique was used to determine the expression of TLRs 2, 4, 5, and 6 in the maternal and fetal parts of the placenta. Moreover, the expressions of IL-1, IL-6, TNF-α and IFN-γ at RNA level in placental samples, peripheral, and cord blood were investigated. Results: The results of the present study indicated that the expressions of TLRs 4, 5 and 6 were significantly increased in both maternal part (p<0.001 and p<0.003 for TLRs 4, 6 and TLR 5, respectively) and fetal part (p<0.001), while TLR2 showed significant increase only in the fetal part of PE placentas (p<0.002). The levels of all studied cytokines showed over-expression within peripheral and cord blood samples from PE patients (p<0.001 for IL-1, IL-6, and IFN-γ and p<0.004 for TNF-α in both cord and peripheral blood samples). Conclusion: The finding of the present study indicated that the expression of the studied TLRs and inflammatory cytokines are generally suppressed in normal pregnancy, but are up regulated in preeclamptic women. Moreover, it seems that the maternal and fetal parts of the placenta may play different roles in the induction of the inflammatory status within the placenta.
Leila Rezanezhad; Jaleh Zolghadri; Behrouz Gharesi-Fard
Volume 10, Issue 4 , December 2013, , Pages 238-246
Abstract
Background: Preeclampsia (PE) is a pregnancy specific syndrome that is associated with high maternal and fetal morbidity and mortality. Glucose regulated protein78 (GRP78) is an Endoplasmic Reticulum (ER) protein which is expressed on the cell surfaces of trophoblast cells under stress or hypoxic condition. ...
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Background: Preeclampsia (PE) is a pregnancy specific syndrome that is associated with high maternal and fetal morbidity and mortality. Glucose regulated protein78 (GRP78) is an Endoplasmic Reticulum (ER) protein which is expressed on the cell surfaces of trophoblast cells under stress or hypoxic condition. GRP78 has a role in aggressive behavior of invasive cells and may play a role in normal placentation. Objectives: To investigate the autoantibody against GRP78 in the sera of patients with PE and to assess the correlation between antibody and severity of the disease. Methods: We evaluated the anti-GRP78 antibody within the sera of fifty pre-eclamptic (12 severe and 38 mild PE) and fifty healthy pregnant women using a home-made ELISA assay. Furthermore, western blot technique was used to assess the expression of GRP78 in placenta of healthy and pre-eclamptic women in their third trimester. The presence of anti-GRP78 antibody in the serum samples from pre-eclamptic and healthy women was also assessed. Results: GRP78 was expressed by placenta, and both healthy and preeclamptic women produced anti-GRP78 antibody. Although no significant difference was found between the pre-eclamptic and healthy women regarding the level of anti-GRP78 antibody, the difference between severe pre-eclamptic and healthy control women was statistically significant (p<0.003). Conclusion: The findings of the present study indicated that measurement of anti-GRP78 antibody may provide a new marker for severe pre-eclampsia. Yet, future studies are required to confirm this notion.
Behrouz Gharesi-Fard; Leila Jafarzadeh; Jaleh Zolghadri; Hossein Haghbin
Volume 9, Issue 4 , December 2012, , Pages 234-240
Abstract
Background: Normal pregnancy is thought to be dependent on Th2 deviation, while Recurrent Pregnancy Loss (RPL) and Pre-eclampsia (PE) appear to be biased toward the Th1 immune response. It is believed that the soluble form of CD30 (sCD30) is an index of Th2 immune response or modulator of Th1/Th2 responses. ...
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Background: Normal pregnancy is thought to be dependent on Th2 deviation, while Recurrent Pregnancy Loss (RPL) and Pre-eclampsia (PE) appear to be biased toward the Th1 immune response. It is believed that the soluble form of CD30 (sCD30) is an index of Th2 immune response or modulator of Th1/Th2 responses. Objective: The aim of this study was determination of the sCD30 level in RPL and PE patients. Methods: The sCD30 level was measured in sera of a group of normal non-pregnant women (N=43) and compared with normal pregnancy at the first (N=42) and third (N=42) trimester. Furthermore, the level of sCD30 in the normal first and third trimester pregnancies were compared with that of RPL (N=38) and severe pre-eclamptic (N=41) patients, respectively. sCD30 levels were measured by ELISA method and student t-test was used for statistical analysis. Results: The mean level of sCD30 at the first trimester in normal pregnancy was significantly elevated as compared with normal non-pregnant women (21.4 vs. 15.2 ng/ml, p<0.0001). A significant difference between sCD30 concentration at the first and third trimester of normal pregnancies was also observed (21.4 vs. 14.3 ng/ml, p<0.0001). Interestingly, the sCD30 concentration did not show any significant changes at the first trimester of normal pregnancy as compared with RPL (21.4 vs. 20.9 ng/ml) and third trimester of normal pregnancy as compared with PE (14.3 vs. 13.1 ng/ml). Conclusion: The data of this study indicated that the concentration of sCD30 in serum during pregnancy period is not associated with RPL or PE and serum sCD30 is not a good correlate of Th2 immune responses in pregnancy.
Behrouz Gharesi-Fard; Jaleh Zolghadri; Leila Foroughinia; Fahimeh Tavazoo; Alamtaj Samsami Dehaghani
Volume 4, Issue 3 , December 2007, , Pages 173-178
Abstract
Background: Recurrent spontaneous abortion (RSA) is defined as three or more se-quential abortions before the twentieth week of gestation. There are evidences to sup-port an allo-immunologic mechanism for RSA. One of the methods for treatment of RSA is leukocyte therapy; however there is still controversy ...
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Background: Recurrent spontaneous abortion (RSA) is defined as three or more se-quential abortions before the twentieth week of gestation. There are evidences to sup-port an allo-immunologic mechanism for RSA. One of the methods for treatment of RSA is leukocyte therapy; however there is still controversy about effectiveness of this method. Objectives: To evaluate the effectiveness of leukocyte therapy for treatment of RSA. Methods: Ninety two non-pregnant women with at least three sequential abor-tions (60 primary & 32 secondary aborters) recognized as RSA were referred to our Laboratory for immunotherapy. All the cases were immunized by isolated lymphocytes from their husbands. Fifty to 100 million washed and resuspended mononuclear cells were injected by I.V., S.C., and I.D. route. The result of each injection was checked by WBC cross matching between couples after four weeks of injections. Immunization was repeated in fifth week to a maximum of 3 times if needed. Eighty one age-matched non-pregnant RSA women (52 primary and 29 secondary aborters) with at least three se-quential abortions were also included in this study as controls. The control group was not immunized. Results: 67 out of 92 (72.8%) immunized cases and 44 out of 81 con-trols (54.3%) showed a successful outcome of pregnancy (p<0.02). Comparison of pri-mary and secondary aborters indicated a significantly better outcome only in primary (75% vs. 42.3%. p<0.001) but not in secondary aborters (68.8% vs. 75.9%, p = 0.7). Conclusion: The present investigation showed the effectiveness of leukocyte therapy in primary but not in secondary RSA patients. Despite the current controversy and limita-tion of leukocyte therapy in RSA, the results of our investigation provide evidence sup-porting the use of allo-immunization in improving the outcome of pregnancy in primary RSA patients.