Am. J. Respir. Crit. Care Med., Vol 151, No. 1, Jan 1995, 170-176.
Latent adenoviral infection in follicular bronchiectasis
ED Bateman, S Hayashi, K Kuwano, TA Wilke and JC Hogg
Pulmonary Research Laboratory, University of British Columbia, St. Paul's Hospital, Vancouver, Canada.
The follicular form of bronchiectasis originally described by Whitwell (1)
has been associated with adenoviral infection. The present study compares
resected lungs from 16 patients with follicular bronchiectasis (in 10 of
whom a nonviral etiology was identified) with those from eight patients
with a nonfollicular histologic pattern. DNA isolated from sections of 45
paraffin-embedded lung samples was subjected to the polymerase chain
reaction (PCR) using primers for the E1A region of the adenovirus genome
and the human HLA DQ alpha gene. In situ hybridization (ISH) was performed
on separate sections cut from the same blocks using a probe for the entire
adenovirus 5 genome. E1A was demonstrated in six of eight patients (75%)
with non-follicular bronchiectasis (non-FB) and in four of 16 (25%) with
follicular bronchiectasis (FB) (p < 0.03, Fisher's exact test). The
optical density ratio for the E1A product of PCR (ratio of E1A product from
specimen to that from 1 pg adenovirus DNA) was significantly lower in FB
than in non-FB (0.057 +/- 0.054 versus 0.365 +/- 0.223 [mean +/- SEM], p
< 0.05). Moreover, the duration of symptoms of bronchiectasis in
patients without E1A in bronchial specimens was significantly shorter than
that of patients with positive E1A PCR products (3.09 +/- 1.44 versus 14.41
+/- 3.33 yr; p < 0.05). By ISH, adenovirus was demonstrated in three
patients with FB and in two with non-FB (17.2 and 18.8% of tissue blocks,
respectively; NS).(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)
