Natural killer activity of colorectal carcinoma patients

Abstract

The natural killer (NK) activity of peripheral blood mononuclear cells in 144 patients with the colorectal carcinoma and 60 healthy individuals as control group was measured and evaluated.
NK activity was significantly lower in patients with lymphnodes metastasis or distant metastasis than in healthy control group. In contrast there was no significant difference of NK activity between the patients without any metastasis and healthy control group.
The serial monitarings of pre- and opst operative NK activity demonstrated almost unchanged level of the activity except for the temporal decrease of the activity during three weeks after the initial operation.
NK activity in colorectal carcinoma patients with lymphnodes metastasis was low throughout any period, although the curative resection of the carcinoma was made.
There was a significant positive correlation between the NK activity and T_γ% of peripheral lymphocyte subpopulation.
Among subpopulation of peripheral blood mononuclear cells classified by monoclonal antibody, NK activity showed the positive correlation with the cell percentage of OKM1⁺ or Leu7⁺ cells, and the negative correlation with the cell percentage of OKT4⁺ or OKT3⁺ cells.