Antibodies to laminin in American cutaneous leishmaniasis.

We found that serum samples from patients with different clinical forms of American cutaneous leishmaniasis (ACL) contained immunoglobulin G and immunoglobulin M antibodies which reacted with laminin but not with various other purified connective tissue components, such as collagen types I, III, IV, and V and fibronectin. Eighty-one percent of ACL patients had high antilaminin antibody levels, with a relationship existing between ACL ulcers and antibody levels. This was not, however, the case with patients having treated and healed ACL ulcers; only 34% of these patients had elevated antilaminin antibodies. Eighty-four percent of chronic Chagas' disease patients were also found to contain antilaminin antibodies that were limited to the immunoglobulin G class, but these were not detected in patients suffering from any of 11 other infectious diseases.