Respiratory Treatment and Prevention (Advances in Experimental Medicine and Biology)

lower percentage of macrophages: lymphocytes

• 41.320.1vs.17.17%,p¼0.001 and
  macrophages – 52.319.2vs. 81.215 %,
  p¼0.003. The counts of neutrophils and
  eosinophils were inappreciably different between
  the patients and controls. The percentage of CD

• was higher in BALF of BBS patients than that
  in controls – 45.115.2 vs. 8.30.2 %,
  p¼0.001. There was an inappreciable differ-
  ence in CD8+ between the patients and healthy
  subjects (16.83.2 vs. 18.14.2 %,
  p¼0.121). The BALF recovery rate was similar
  in the BBS and control groups.
  BALF levels of OPG, sRANKL, and IL-
  are shown in Fig. 1. The OPG concentration
  was similar in the BBS patients and healthy
  subjects [OPG: 0.22 (0.14–0.84) vs. 0.

(0.14–0.75) pmol/l, p¼0.744] (Fig.1a). The

sRANKL and IL-18 concentrations were signifi-

cantly greater in the BBS patients compared with

healthy subjects [sRANKL: 2.12 (0.82–10.23)

vs. 1.12 (0.79–4.39) pmol/l, p¼0.013; IL-18:

34.29 (12.5–133.70) vs. 13.05 (12.43–25.88)

pg/ml, p¼0.001] (Fig.1b, c ).

There were significant correlations between

sRANKL and IL-18 (r¼0.742, p¼0.0001)

(Fig. 2) and OPG and DLCO (r¼0.528,

p¼0.029) (Fig.3) in BALF of BBS patients.

Moreover, sRANKL correlated positively with

the percentage of lymphocytes (r¼0.60,

p¼0.003) and negatively with the percentage

of macrophages (r¼–0.58, p¼0.005) in these

patients. The correlations above outlined were

absent in the healthy group.

0.9 a

c

b

120

100

80

60

40

20

0

12

10

8

6

4

2

0

0.

0.

0.

0.

OPG in BALF (pmol/I)

IL-18 in BALF (pg/ml)

sRANKL in BALF (pmol/I)

0.

0.

0.

0.

Healthy

p = 0.744 p = 0.

p = 0.

Median

Min - Max

25-75%

BBS Healthy BBS

Healthy BBS

Fig. 1 (a) Concentration of osteoprotegerin (OPG); (b)
Soluble receptor activator of nuclear factor-kappaB
(sRANKL); and (c) interleukin-18 (IL-18) in

bronchoalveolar lavage fluid (BALF) of sarcoidosis

(BBS – Besniera-Boeck-Schaumann disease) patients

compared with those in healthy subjects

4 W. Naumnik et al.