Clinical value of the determination of an interferon-induced enzyme activity: studies of the 2'5' oligoadenylate synthetase activity in peripheral blood lymphocytes of patients.

The 2'5' oligoadenylate synthetase (2'5' A synthetase) is one of the interferon-induced enzymes. The measurement of its activity may thus reveal the presence of interferon, which is one of the body's non-specific antiviral, antitumor, and immunoregulatory agents. We found a constant level of this enzyme activity (mean value: 0.31 units +/- 0.13 S. D.) when measured in the white blood cells of healthy subjects (104). The majority of the patients with viral (27/30), bacterial (13/16) and autoimmune (15/16) diseases showed a 2'5' A synthetase activity greater than 0.57 units (mean value of the control + S. D.). Conversely the 2'5' A synthetase activity level was normal or low in malignancies and in diseases depending on other aetiologies than those described above. Therefore this simple an rapid biochemical assay seems to be useful for clinical study of infectious and inflammatory diseases.