Figure 5.

The effect of the corticoid hydrocortisone in controlling the responsiveness of CD4⁺ and CD8⁺ T cells from MS patients to TLR-2 and TLR-4 agonists according to relapse occurrence. Circulating CD4⁺ (A to C) and CD8⁺ (D to F) T cells (0.5 x 10⁶/mL), purified at baseline (t0) from relapsed (Relp, n=6; 2 naïve and 4 undergoing DMT) and non-relapsed (Stab, n=10; 5 naïve and 5 undergoing DMT) MS patients during the observation period (1 year) were activated for 2 days in the presence of Pam3C (1 µg/mL) or LPS (100 ng/mL). The effectiveness of corticoid was evaluated after culturing these cells in the presence of hydrocortisone (HC, 10⁻⁶ and 10^–5 (M). The IL-1β (A), IL-6 (B), and IL-17 (C), released by CD4⁺ T cells, and IL-1β (D), IL-6 (E), and IL-17 (F) produced by CD8⁺ T cells, was evaluated by Multiplex. The data are shown as mean ± SD of five independent experiments with 3 to 5 samples per experiment. Significance was calculated using one-way ANOVA. The p values are indicated in the figure.