J.Jpn. Surg. Soc.. 86(9): 1100-1103, 1985

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Report on the annual meeting

CHANGES IN CELLULAR IMMUNITY AND THEIR EFFECT ON PULMONARY INFECTIONS AND PROGNOSIS AFTER SURGERY OF THE ESOPHAGEAL CANCER PATIENTS

In esophageal cancer patients, pneumonia in an early (20％) and a late (3.5％) period, pythorax except for leakage (8％) and pulmonary tuberculosis (1.4％) were observed characteristically through the post operative course.
Changes in cellular immunity through the course were indicated with remarkable depression of PHA stimulation index (s.i.) and T cell number. The lowest values during 5-year survey were observed 2 weeks after surgery. Especially, cases with post operative pulmonary infections had low PHA s.i. and low T cell number for long time, different from cases without them. As regards T cell subsets, both helper T and suppressor T decreased dramatically early after surgery and helper T kept in low value for long time, in contrast to suppressor T returned to norrnal range gradually, and then H/S ratio also depressively changed.
Therefore, suppressive immunity after surgery must result in pulmonary infections and cause critical conditions.
Cases with well reacted lymphocytes indicated high 5 years survival rate (40％).

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