Evolution of anti-Trypanosoma cruzi antibody production in patients with chronic Chagas disease: Correlation between antibody titers and development of cardiac disease severity

Chagas disease is one of the most important endemic infections in latin america affecting around 6–7 million people. about 30–50% of patients develop the cardiac form of the disease,which can lead to severe cardiac dysfunction and death. in this scenario,the identification of immunological markers of disease progression would be a valuable tool for early treatment and reduction of death rates. in this observational study,the production of anti-trypanosoma cruzi antibodies through a retrospective longitudinal follow-up in chronic chagas disease patients´ cohort and its correlation with disease progression and heart commitment was evaluated. strong inverse correlation (ρ = -0.6375,p = 0.0005) between anti-t. cruzi igg1titers and left ventricular ejection fraction (lvef) in chronic chagas cardiomyopathy (ccc) patients were observed after disease progression. elevated levels of anti-t. cruzi igg3titers were detected in all t. cruzi-infected patients,indicating a lack of correlation of this igg isotype with disease progression. furthermore,low levels of anti-t. cruzi igg2,igg4,and iga were detected in all patients through the follow-up. although without statistical significance anti-t. cruzi ige tends to be more reactive in patients with the indeterminate form (ind) of the disease (p = 0.0637). as this study was conducted in patients with many years of chronic disease no anti-t. cruzi igm was detected. taken together,these results indicate that the levels of anti-t. cruzi igg1could be considered to seek for promising biomarkers to predict the severity of chronic chagas disease cardiomyopathy. © 2017 georg et al.