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The association of giardiasis with reduced intestinal secretory immunoglobulin A

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Abstract

Patients with dysgammaglobulinemia frequently harborGiardia lamblia in the upper intestinal tract. However, in patients with symptomatic giardiasis serum immunoglobulin deficiencies have not been a constant or prevailing finding. Immunoglobulin level in duodenal aspirates from 10 patients with chronic symptomatic giardiasis and 10 control subjects were examined under controlled conditions, 3 to 9 months afterGiardia lamblia were eradicated with quinacrine and intestinal morphology and function were presumably fully recovered. Serum immunoglobulin concentrations in 10 patients with symptomatic giardiasis were within the normal range. In contrast, secretory IgA of the aspirates from the duodenojejunal junction of these patients was significantly lower (mean, 52.4 mg/100ml) than that obtained from aspirates of the 10 control subjects under identical conditions (mean, 162.3 mg/100ml) (P<0.01). The results indicate that the function of secretory immunoglobulins can be dissociated from serum immunoglobulins, and that decreased concentrations of secretory IgA predisposed our patients to colonization of intestinal mucous membranes byG lamblia with subsequent chronic diarrhea.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. From the Departments of Medicine, Minneapolis Veterans Administration Hospital and University of Minnesota Medical School, 55417, Minneapolis, Minnesota

    Horace H. Zinneman MD & Arnold P. Kaplan MD

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  1. Horace H. Zinneman MD
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  2. Arnold P. Kaplan MD
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Supported by Veterans Administration Grant No. 9890.01/171-04.

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Zinneman, H.H., Kaplan, A.P. The association of giardiasis with reduced intestinal secretory immunoglobulin A. Digest Dis Sci 17, 793–797 (1972). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02231148

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