Searchable abstracts of presentations at key conferences in endocrinology
Endocrine Abstracts (2009) 20 P492

1Department of Endocrinology and Metabolism, 2Department of Immunology and 3Department of Clinical Biochemistry, Gulhane Military Medical Academy, Etlik/ankara, Turkey.


Aim: The prevalence of overweight and obesity is increasing and becoming a global health problem. Obesity is the cause of increased cardiovascular morbidity and mortality and psychosocial problems. There are several reports which mentioning the unfavourable effects of aggressive weight loss regimes on the immune system. This study was designed to search for the effect of a straightforward, controlled and permanent weight loss program on the immune system.

Material and method: Overall 76 patients who have body mass indexes (BMI) higher than 30 kg/m2 were enrolled. The number of the control subjects was 139. Any chronic systemic illness, chronic drug intake, smoking and alcohol intake were the exclusion criteria. The venous samples were taken both before and after the standard diet and exercise program. The percentage of the lymphocyte subgroups (CD3, CD4, CD8, CD19, CD3, CD16, CD56) were measure by flow cytometry.

Results: According to the results the CD3+ and CD8+T cells were significantly lower and the CD19+B cells were significantly higher in the obese patients when compared to the controls. After a 3 months duration of diet and exercise 26 patients of the total group lost about a 5% of their total body weight. After the weight loss the CD3+ and CD8+T cells, CD19+B cells, CD4/CD8 ratio increased, and CD8+T cells decreased. When the patients who lost weight were compared with the healthy controls, the CD8+T cells and CD3-CD16+56+ NK cell ratios were lower and the CD19 B+ cells were higher.

Discussion: According to the results it can be inferred that the adaptive component of cellular immunity is decreased with a compensatory increase in the humoral immune response in patients with obesity. Weight loss does not improve the number of cytotoxic T cells and cause a further decrement in the other cytotoxic CD3-CD16+56+ NK cells

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