Chronic restraint stress impairs T-cell immunity and promotes tumor progression in mice
Long-term exposure to stressful situations can affect the immune system. The T-cell response is an important component of anti-tumoral immunity. Hence, impairment of the immune function induced by a chronic stressor has been postulated to alter the immunosurveillance of tumors, thus leading to a wor...
Guardado en:
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2009
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| Acceso en línea: | https://bibliotecadigital.exactas.uba.ar/collection/paper/document/paper_10253890_v12_n2_p134_Frick http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12110/paper_10253890_v12_n2_p134_Frick |
| Aporte de: |
| Sumario: | Long-term exposure to stressful situations can affect the immune system. The T-cell response is an important component of anti-tumoral immunity. Hence, impairment of the immune function induced by a chronic stressor has been postulated to alter the immunosurveillance of tumors, thus leading to a worse neoplastic prognosis. Here, we show that chronic restraint stress affects T-cell mediated immunity in mice. This was evidenced by a decrease of mitogen-induced T-cell proliferation, a reduction in CD4+T lymphocyte number and a decrease of tumor necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-α) and Interferon-gamma (IFN-γ) production in stressed mice. Additionally, mice subjected to chronic restraint stress displayed an enhancement of tumor growth in a syngeneic lymphoma model, i.e. an increase of tumor proliferation and a reduction of animal survival. Finally, stressed mice had a reduced specific cytotoxic response against these tumor cells. These results suggest that chronic exposure to stress promotes cancer establishment and subsequent progression, probably by depressing T-cell mediated immunity. The T-cell immunity impairment as well as the tumor progression enhancement emphasize the importance of the therapeutic management of stress to improve the prognosis of cancer patients. © Informa Healthcare USA, Inc. |
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