Abstract
A simultaneous measurement of luminol-dependent chemiluminescence (CL) to two different stimulants, such as phorbol myristate acetate (PMA) and opsonized zymosan (OZ) was developed for evaluating acute and chronic bacterial infections. CL response to PMA (CL-PMA) was sharply increased and CL-OZ was moderately increased in the patients with acute bacterial infections, evidenced by sputum bacteriology and cytology in accordance with high fever, leukocytosis and positive C-reactive protein. A ratio of CL-PMA to CL-OZ during acute bacterial infections was significantly higher than that of normal adults. When the patients with chronic diseases, such as chronic bronchitis, emphysema, bronchiectasis, lung cancer etc., had acute bacterial infections, the CL responses of them were basically the same as that of acute bacterial infections but the CL-OZ showed much greater increase than that of acute infections, though a ratio of CL-PMA to CL-OZ was similar to that of normal adults.
There was very good correlation between CL-PMA and CL-OZ and also between peripheral leukocyte counts and either CL-PMA or CL-OZ in patients with acute bacterial infections but not in healthy adults nor in patients with other diseases.
