Intraepidermal neuron-specific enolase (NSE)-immunoreactive nerve fibres: evidence for sprouting in uremic patients on maintenance hemodialysis.

The use of indirect immunohistochemistry in 12 patients on maintenance hemodialysis has shown weak or moderately strong neuron-specific enolase (NSE)-immunoreactive nerve terminals and fibres sprouting throughout the layers of the epidermis. No such terminals or fibres were found in any of 15 controls. There was no difference between uremic patients with pruritus and those without. Furthermore, NSE-positive nerve fibres with a normal appearance were seen in the dermis, at the epidermal-dermal junctional zone and sometimes entering the stratum basale in both patients and controls. The immunoreactive nerves were thin, smooth and, at their terminal fields, varicose. The immunoreactivity seemed to be associated chiefly with sensory nerves. Thus, our results suggest that uremic patients undergoing maintenance hemodialysis develop an abnormal pattern of cutaneous innervation.