Immunomodulatory role of prolactin in diabetes development.

Pituitary hormone and cytokine prolactin (PRL) is one of the mediators of the bidirectional communication between neuroendocrine and immune systems. It participates in many immunomodulatory activities, affects differentiation and maturation of both, B and T lymphocytes and enhances inflammatory responses and production of immunoglobulins. Hyperprolactinemia has been described in many autoimmune diseases, both systemic (SLE, RA, PsA) and organ-specific (T1D, CD and others) and the activity of PRL has been intensively studied. Nevertheless, no data on PRL contribution to pathogenesis of diabetes mellitus is available, although the effect of PRL on beta cells of the pancreas and insulin secretion has been observed.