Blood polymorphonuclear dysfunction in patients with alcoholic cirrhosis.

Polymorphonuclear leucocyte function was investigated in twenty patients with alcoholic cirrhosis and three patients with cryptogenic cirrhosis. Bacterial ingestion, oxygen-dependent bactericidal capacity, and chemotactic response were measured. Serum dependent abnormalities were common; they included deficiencies of ingestion and of all subsequent oxygen-dependent metabolic events (three patients), all oxygen-dependent metabolic events (one patient), cytochrome c reduction and iodination deficiencies (six patients), isolated cytochrome c reduction deficiency (ten patients), and chemotactic deficiencies (fourteen out of eighteen patients). Serum-independent abnormalities were much less common; they included increased ingestion rate (four patients), decreased stimulated reduction of nitroblue tetrazolium (three patients), and decreased myeloperoxidase content (eight patients). Polymorphonuclear leucocyte abnormalities are frequent in cirrhosis and may account in part for increased susceptibility to infection in that disease.