Expression Of CRF In Nasal Mucosa And Its Relationship With Upper Airway Inflammatory Diseases

Objective:Airway inflammation is defined as a chronical inflammatory disease involving various inflammatory cells and inflammatory mediators. So far its management is not quite satisfactory partly because of its unveiled mechanism. Therefore it is very important to further investigate the pathogenesis of airway inflammation so as to develop a novel stragegy for this disease. Studies indicates that corticotropin releasing factor (CRF) plays an important role in this inflammatory process. The objective of this study is to localize CRF in human nasal mucosa and nasal polyps by immunohistochemistry.Method:Nine cases of allergic rhinitis (AR) and ten cases of AR complicated with nasal polyps (AR-w-polyp) were enrolled. The lower turbinates from AR group and polyps from AR-w-polyp were collected, studied by immunohistochemistry to detect the expression of CRF.Hematoxylin-Eosin (HE) staining for Eos and Toluidine-blue staining for mast cells were done respectively. The lower turbinates from septuplasty in seven cases were harvested as controls.Result:The expression of CRF in nasal mucosa from allergic rhinitis (0.273±0.028) and in polyps from AR-w-polyp (0.264±0.019) were dramatically higher than that in controls (0.229±0.015)(P<0.05), and no remarkable difference in terms of the expression of CRF between the two groups (AR vs AR-w-polyp) was found (P>0.05). The number of MC and EOS in AR group (13.90±3.08,10.22±2.96)and In AR-w-polyp group (12.59±2.69,6.23±3.23) were significantly higher than those in control(7.33±4.18,4.48±2.38).Besides, the expression of CRF was positivly correlated with the numbers eosinophils and mast cells (R=0.732,0.582).Conclusion:The present study indicates that CRF is likely to play key roles in the inflammatory process of allergic rhinitis and polyps. Mast cells are possible candidate secretory cells of CRF in nasal mucosa. The finding of CRF in nasal mucosa and its involvement in the airway inflammatory diseases suggests a novel management strategy.