NUTRITION, IMMUNITY AND INFECTIONS - T-LYMPHOCYTE SUBPOPULATIONS IN PROTEIN-ENERGY MALNUTRITION

Protein energy malnutrition (PEM) is one of the most frequent causes o f secondary immune deficiency states. Alterations either in cellular o r humoral immune mechanisms increase the susceptibility to infections in the malnourished organism. Infections aggravate the interrelationsh ip of malnutrition to immune deficiency and infections, resulting in f uture adverse effects of malnutrition on humoral and cellular immune s ystems, IgG, IgM, IgA, C3, and T lymphocyte subpopulations were identi fied in 29 patients with PEM and 15 healthy infants serving as the con trol group, ranging between 3 and 24 months of age. Patients with PEM demonstrated elevated levels of IgG, IgM and IgA when compared to the control group (P<0.01, P<0.01, P<0.01), C3 levels were significantly l ower than the values of the control group (P<0.01).