Immunological investigations of patients with transplanted cornea.

Authors examined the role of the cellular immunity by the method (I) of lymphoblastic transformation in 26 keratoplasty cases. Only in one case did they observe significant blast transformation, in this case the keratoplasty was necessary after injury with lime. In the rest of the cases no positive result were ever obtained. They investigated the cellular immunoreactivity of 10 patients waiting for keratoplasty and 10 cataractous patients against cornea antigen by means (II) of the Leucocyte Migration Test (LMT). The change of the cellular immuno-reactivity against cornea antigen was examined on the 1st, 4th, 7th, 14th, 21st, and 28th days after keratoplasty. It could be established that after keratoplasty the LMT became positive (inhibition or stimulation of migration). The results of the LMT investigations obtained on keratoplasty patients by cornea antigen may be of some help for the understanding of the events in the postoperative phase and sometimes also may eventually require immunosuppressive therapy.