In this paper, we sought to determine if chronic chagasic patlents with cardiopathy could be distinguished from those displaying non-chagasic cardiopathy on the basis of T cell proliferative responses to cruzipain (GP57/51), a major antigen of T. cruzi. Assays were performed with peripheral blood mononuclear cells from 24 individuals classified as follows: normal donors (n = 8), patients with non-chagasic cardiopathy (n = 8) and patients with chronic chagasic cardiopathy without morbid associations (n = 8). The analysis of variance indicated that the proliferative responses stimulated by cruzipain were significantly higher in the group of chagasic patients (p = 0,0001). Tukey's multiple comparison test shoived that the proliferative index medium from normal and non-chagasic cardiopathy was not significantly different from each other. We conclude that the T cell responses agains T. cruzipain, as measured by proliferative indices of cells found in peripheral blood, are exclusively associated with Chagas, disease. In view of the abundance of cruzipain antigen in amastigotes it is possible that these T cell specificities contribute to the heart tissue damage obsewed in chronic Chagas, disease patients
Trypanosoma cruzi; Chronic chagasic cardiopathy; Cruzipain; Chagas disease; T cells