SICAM-1, SE-SELECTIN AND SVCAM-1 ARE CONSTITUTIVELY PRESENT IN HUMAN SKIN LYMPH AND INCREASED IN ALLERGIC CONTACT-DERMATITIS

The expression of intercellular adhesion molecule-1 (ICAM-1), vascular cell adhesion molecule-1 (VCAM-1) and E-selectin is important for the regulation of the leucocyte traffic into and in inflammatory dermatos es. ICAM-1, VCAM-1 and E-selectin were initially identified as cell-su rface proteins, but recent evidence suggests that they also exist in a soluble form, The collection of human afferent lymph exclusively deri ving from a selected skin area allows insight into local pathomechanis ms as well as signal transmission in skin disorders, In the present st udy we measured the concentrations of the soluble adhesion molecules ( sAM) sICAM-1, sVCAM-1 and sE-selectin in human skin lymph derived from normal untreated skin, irritant contact dermatitis (CD) and the induc tion and elicitation phases of allergic CD, The strong elicitation rea ctions of allergic CD produced an increase in sAM output to about thre e times the baseline values but in the weaker irritant CD we observed no increase at all, In the induction phase of allergic CD the concentr ations during the first 9 days of the experiment remained unchanged, a s in the lymph derived from normal untreated skin, but were slightly i ncreased thereafter, To our knowledge, no in vivo data exist on the lo cal involvement of sAM in irritant and allergic CD in humans, Our resu lts provide evidence of increased concentrations of sAM mainly in stro ng allergic CD.