Circulating CD4+CD8+ T lymphocytes in patients with Kawasaki disease.

We serially monitored cell surface antigen expression on mononuclear cells in peripheral blood isolated from patients with Kawasaki disease (KD), and found, for the first time, that a markedly increased number of CD4+CD8+ T lymphocytes was present in some of the patients (11 of the 24 cases). The cases of five of these 11 patients were complicated with coronary artery lesion (CAL); the 13 patients with normal numbers of CD4+CD8+ T lymphocytes did not have CAL. The patients' age, sex and grade of systemic inflammation evaluated by peripheral leucocyte count and serum C-reactive protein levels were not correlated to the number of CD4+CD8+ T lymphocytes. Other cell surface antigen characteristics of the CD4+CD8+ T lymphocytes included CD3+, CD45RA+, CD45RO+, CD16-, and HLA-DR+. These results indicate that the surface antigen characteristics of the KD peripheral blood examined were the same as those of Epstein-Barr virus infection without CD45RA+. These findings provide useful information for the analysis of the pathogenesis of KD.