Coxsackie B virus‐specific IgM responses in coronary care unit patients

Abstract

An enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) test using polyvalent antigens and antisera was used to detect Coxsackie B virus-specific IgM responses in 329 patients admitted to the Coronary Care Unit, Wellington Hospital, New Zealand over a 12-month period. The sera of 30 of 153 (19.6%) patients with acute myocardial infarction (AMI), 16 of 98 (18.4%) with chest pain, and 7 of 46 (15.2%) patients with arrhythmia were positive for Coxsackie B virus-specific IgM. Four of 12 (25%) patients with heart failure were also positive. Over the same period, 178 sex- and age-matched normal blood donors were also studied. Eleven of 178 (6.2%) matched blood donors were positive for Coxsackie B virus-specific IgM. The rates of occurrence of Coxsackie B virus-specific IgM in patients with AMI and in a group of matched controls showed a significant difference (chi 2 = 5.64, p = 0.02).

Coxsackie B3 Virus: An Unusual Cause of Unilateral Mediastinal Nodal Enlargement

“…The warmer months of summer and au tumn appear to be favorable to coxsackie B viruses infections [2], Direct or indirect fecal-oral transmission is considered the most common mode of spread. Sewagecontaminated water, contaminated food, or insect vectors may occasionally be the source of infection.…”

“…These specific IgM antibodies detected by Elisa test reach their peak titers in 2-3 weeks and thereafter decline to undetectable lev els [12,13]. Their presence is indicative of a current or recent antigenic stimulus [2], On the contrary, specific IgG antibod ies begin to rise on the 15th day, reach a peak after the first month and then tend to remain elevated for months [13,14]. The specificity of IgG antibody detection methods varies greatly according to which one is used.…”

“…Hyper bilirubinemia and elevated transaminase and alkaline phosphatase levels may be seen [3]. Rheumatoid factor may appear in the course of infection as seen in a lot of other virus infections [2,11], Diagnosis of coxsackie B3 virus infec tion may be established during the first 2 weeks only by virus isolation from throat, swabs, heart tissue, body fluids, blood and stool specimens [3,12], However, as for all viral infections, the diagnosis is possible by serological evaluation requiring the demonstration of at least fourfold IgM an tibody titer changes between paired acute (less than a week) and convalescent (2 weeks or longer) serum samples. These specific IgM antibodies detected by Elisa test reach their peak titers in 2-3 weeks and thereafter decline to undetectable lev els [12,13].…”

“…These are varied: most usual is chest pain as a result of acute myocarditis, pericarditis and Bornholm disease: less commonly seen are aseptic meningitis, encephalitis, exanthems and enanthems, orchitis, conjunctivitis, oro pharyngeal lesions and diarrhea [2][3][4][5][6][7]. Respiratory tract manifestations include pleural effusions and pneumonia.…”

Enterovirus in arteriosclerosis: A pilot study

“…Second, CV-B are able to potentiate inflammation as well as cholesterol accumulation in mouse heart and aorta (Burch, 1975;Campbell et al, 1978;Illback et al, 1990). Third, seroepidemiologic studies have reported that recent enteroviral infection could precede myocardial infarction (Lau, 1986;Nicholls and Thomas, 1977;Roivainen et al, 1998;Wood et al, 1978). Fourth, enteroviral antigen, as well as RNA, has been detected in some vascular tissue of humans who died of infarction (Burch et al, 1973;Calabrese et al, 2003).…”