Manish Butte

Rinsho Ketsueki. 2021;62(8):1327-1333. doi: 10.11406/rinketsu.62.1327.

ABSTRACT

Inherited bone marrow failure syndromes (IBMFS) are caused by genetic mutations at loci associated with DNA repair, telomere maintenance, and ribosome function. Hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT) can result in a permanent cure in transfusion-dependent patients if reduced-intensity conditioning and long-term screening for relapse can be successfully implemented. Primary immunodeficiency diseases (PIDs) arise from inborn errors of the host immune system and affected patients must protect themselves against intractable infections and immune system dysregulation. HSCT is curative in many pediatric patients; however, specific immunomodulatory therapies are now available for controlling autoimmune and/or autoinflammatory diseases. Advanced clinical sequencing technologies have continued to identify novel monogenic diseases that share the phenotype of hematological and immunological abnormalities, along with adult cases of IBMFS and/or PIDs. Importantly, genetic counseling is required for carrier detection while selecting sibling donors for HSCT. Here, we describe treatment strategies for IBMFS and/or PIDs and associated pitfalls.

PMID:34497223 | DOI:10.11406/rinketsu.62.1327

Pediatr Allergy Immunol Pulmonol. 2021 Sep;34(3):115-118. doi: 10.1089/ped.2021.0002.

ABSTRACT

Introduction: The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has listed primary immunodeficiency disorders as being predisposed to severe coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). However, patients affected with X-linked agammaglobulinemia (XLA) have shown contrary results. In this study, we present 2 boys in late adolescence from south India with XLA who were infected with severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), as well as a review of cases reported in the literature. Case Presentation: Two patients with XLA had been diagnosed late and were started on regular immunoglobulin prophylaxis only during adolescence. Both of them had developed bronchiectasis, an irreversible suppurative lung disease. However, both patients made an uneventful recovery without the need for artificial ventilation or convalescent plasma. Conclusion: Successful outcomes of patients with XLA and COVID-19, except for delayed recovery, from our experience and from global reports are intriguing and the role of B cell depletion is being studied as well. Further research and clinical experience are necessary to fully elucidate the reasons for these observations.

PMID:34495748 | DOI:10.1089/ped.2021.0002

Front Immunol. 2021 Aug 19;12:697307. doi: 10.3389/fimmu.2021.697307. eCollection 2021.

ABSTRACT

The interplay between T- and B-cell compartments during naïve, effector and memory T cell maturation is critical for a balanced immune response. Primary B-cell immunodeficiency arising from X-linked agammaglobulinemia (XLA) offers a model to explore B cell impact on T cell subsets, starting from the thymic selection. Here we investigated characteristics of naïve and effector T cell subsets in XLA patients, revealing prominent alterations in the corresponding T-cell receptor (TCR) repertoires. We observed immunosenescence in terms of decreased diversity of naïve CD4⁺ and CD8⁺ TCR repertoires in XLA donors. The most substantial alterations were found within naïve CD4⁺ subsets, and we have investigated these in greater detail. In particular, increased clonality and convergence, along with shorter CDR3 regions, suggested narrower focused antigen-specific maturation of thymus-derived naïve T_reg (CD4⁺CD45RA⁺CD27⁺CD25⁺) in the absence of B cells – normally presenting diverse self and commensal antigens. The naïve T_reg proportion among naïve CD4 T cells was decreased in XLA patients, supporting the concept of impaired thymic naïve T_reg selection. Furthermore, the naïve T_reg subset showed prominent differences at the transcriptome level, including increased expression of genes specific for antigen-presenting and myeloid cells. Altogether, our findings suggest active B cell involvement in CD4 T cell subsets maturation, including B cell-dependent expansion of the naïve Treg TCR repertoire that enables better control of self-reactive T cells.

PMID:34489944 | PMC:PMC8417104 | DOI:10.3389/fimmu.2021.697307

Front Immunol. 2021 Aug 17;12:720025. doi: 10.3389/fimmu.2021.720025. eCollection 2021.

ABSTRACT

Inborn Errors of Immunity (IEI) comprise more than 450 inherited diseases, from which selected patients manifest a frequent and early incidence of malignancies, mainly lymphoma and leukemia. Primary antibody deficiency (PAD) is the most common form of IEI with the highest proportion of malignant cases. In this review, we aimed to compare the oncologic hallmarks and the molecular defects underlying PAD with other IEI entities to dissect the impact of avoiding immune destruction, genome instability, and mutation, enabling replicative immortality, tumor-promoting inflammation, resisting cell death, sustaining proliferative signaling, evading growth suppressors, deregulating cellular energetics, inducing angiogenesis, and activating invasion and metastasis in these groups of patients. Moreover, some of the most promising approaches that could be clinically tested in both PAD and IEI patients were discussed.

PMID:34484227 | PMC:PMC8416062 | DOI:10.3389/fimmu.2021.720025

Front Immunol. 2021 Aug 13;12:696403. doi: 10.3389/fimmu.2021.696403. eCollection 2021.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: Infections are the major cause of morbidity and mortality in patients with primary immunodeficiency disease (PID). Timely and accurate microbiological diagnosis is particularly important in these patients. Metagenomic next-generation sequencing (mNGS) has been used for pathogen detection recently. However, few reports describe the use of mNGS for pathogen identification in patients with PID.

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the utility of mNGS for detecting pathogens in patients with PID, and to compare it with conventional microbiological tests (CMT).

METHODS: This single center retrospective study investigated the diagnostic performance of mNGS for pathogens detection in PID patients and compared it with CMT. Sixteen PID patients with suspected infection were enrolled, and medical records were analyzed to extract detailed clinical characteristics such as gene variation, immune status, microbial distribution, time-consuming of mNGS and CMT, treatment, and outcomes.

RESULTS: mNGS identified pathogenic microbe in 93.75% samples, compared to 31.25% for culture and 68.75% for conventional methods, and detected an extra 18 pathogenic microorganisms including rare opportunistic pathogens and Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Pathogen identification by mNGS required 48 hours, compared with bacterial culture for 3-7 days and even longer for fungus and Mycobacterium tuberculosis culture.

CONCLUSIONS: mNGS has marked advantages over conventional methods for pathogenic diagnosis, particularly opportunistic pathogens and mixed infections, in patients with PID. This method might enable clinicians to make more timely and targeted therapeutic decisions, thereby improving the prognosis of these patients.

PMID:34484193 | PMC:PMC8414648 | DOI:10.3389/fimmu.2021.696403

J Hum Genet. 2021 Sep 6. doi: 10.1038/s10038-021-00977-z. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

Hereditary spastic paraplegias (HSPs) comprise a group of neurodegenerative disorders characterized by weakness and leg spasticity. LYST is responsible for Chédiak-Higashi syndrome (CHS), which exhibits partial oculocutaneous albinism, primary immunodeficiency, and bleeding tendency in childhood. Although neurological symptoms of CHS also appear in adulthood, a phenotype of spastic paraplegia has rarely been reported in CHS. In this study, we investigated LYST mutations in 387 HSP patients through the Japan Spastic Paraplegia Research Consortium to clarify the frequency of LYST mutations in HSP, finding six adult patients with LYST mutations in four HSP families. They exhibited intellectual disability, cerebellar ataxia, neuropathy, and pyramidal signs. Meanwhile, only 15 patients with CHS in childhood have been revealed in a decade by a nationwide survey in Japan. Thus, LYST mutations might indicate a HSP phenotype in a considerable number of adult patients with CHS.

PMID:34483340 | DOI:10.1038/s10038-021-00977-z

Methods Mol Biol. 2022;2313:27-44. doi: 10.1007/978-1-0716-1450-1_2.

ABSTRACT

Over the years, a wide variety of therapeutic antibodies has been successfully introduced in the autoimmunology clinic and many more are on the edge to follow. Many of these treatments address either a pathogenic circulating molecule or a cell-bound molecule. Whereas the former target results in neutralization of the soluble factor, the latter target either inhibits cellular function or induces selective cell death. If this targeted molecule or cell is part of the immune system, this therapy evokes a state of immunodeficiency. Knowing the exact function of the respective components enables the risk stratification for possible infectious complications in patients treated with biologics. Much of the understanding of the function of immune cells and their associated molecules, in relation to redundancy in the immune system, is derived from studies in knockout mice. However, as mice are not men in terms of their life-expectancy, their infection exposure, or the composition of their immune system, the most useful knowledge for estimating the consequence of therapeutic intervention on immune competence comes from monitoring patients. In the current chapter, we focus on patients with a primary immunodeficiency (PID) because they provide us with a unique perspective to estimate the redundancy of a certain genetic defect for overall immune competence. These patients have inborn errors of the immune system that, in general, are due to single gene defects. Depending on the immunological pathway that is defective, patients can present with different types of (opportunistic) infectious diseases, as well as other clinical manifestations. Based on selected examples, we focus in this chapter on finding parallels in the infectious risk of autoimmune patients treated with biologics and PID patients with a defect in the immunological pathway that is affected by the respective biologic. The goal is to learn from the (dis)similarities between both patient populations in terms of safety profiles of biologic treatments.

PMID:34478130 | DOI:10.1007/978-1-0716-1450-1_2

J Clin Immunol. 2021 Sep 3. doi: 10.1007/s10875-021-01090-8. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

Patients with ataxia-telangiectasia (A-T) suffer from progressive cerebellar ataxia, immunodeficiency, respiratory failure, and cancer susceptibility. From a clinical point of view, A-T patients with IgA deficiency show more symptoms and may have a poorer prognosis. In this study, we analyzed mortality and immunity data of 659 A-T patients with regard to IgA deficiency collected from the European Society for Immunodeficiencies (ESID) registry and from 66 patients with classical A-T who attended at the Frankfurt Goethe-University between 2012 and 2018. We studied peripheral B- and T-cell subsets and T-cell repertoire of the Frankfurt cohort and survival rates of all A-T patients in the ESID registry. Patients with A-T have significant alterations in their lymphocyte phenotypes. All subsets (CD3, CD4, CD8, CD19, CD4/CD45RA, and CD8/CD45RA) were significantly diminished compared to standard values. Patients with IgA deficiency (n = 35) had significantly lower lymphocyte counts compared to A-T patients without IgA deficiency (n = 31) due to a further decrease of naïve CD4 T-cells, central memory CD4 cells, and regulatory T-cells. Although both patient groups showed affected TCR-ß repertoires compared to controls, no differences could be detected between patients with and without IgA deficiency. Overall survival of patients with IgA deficiency was significantly diminished. For the first time, our data show that patients with IgA deficiency have significantly lower lymphocyte counts and subsets, which are accompanied with reduced survival, compared to A-T patients without IgA deficiency. IgA, a simple surrogate marker, is indicating the poorest prognosis for classical A-T patients. Both non-interventional clinical trials were registered at clinicaltrials.gov 2012 (Susceptibility to infections in ataxia-telangiectasia; NCT02345135) and 2017 (Susceptibility to Infections, tumor risk and liver disease in patients with ataxia-telangiectasia; NCT03357978).

PMID:34477998 | DOI:10.1007/s10875-021-01090-8

Hematol Oncol. 2021 Sep 3. doi: 10.1002/hon.2921. Online ahead of print.

NO ABSTRACT

PMID:34477234 | DOI:10.1002/hon.2921

J Microbiol Immunol Infect. 2021 Aug 26:S1684-1182(21)00178-X. doi: 10.1016/j.jmii.2021.07.012. Online ahead of print.

NO ABSTRACT

PMID:34475002 | DOI:10.1016/j.jmii.2021.07.012