Journal article
Virologic and Immunologic Evidence Supporting an Association between HHV-6 and Hashimoto's Thyroiditis
E Caselli, MC Zatelli, R Rizzo, S Benedetti, D Martorelli, G Trasforini, E Cassai, EC degli Uberti, D Di Luca, R Dolcetti
Plos Pathogens | PUBLIC LIBRARY SCIENCE | Published : 2012
Open access
Abstract
Hashimoto's thyroiditis (HT) is the most common of all thyroid diseases and is characterized by abundant lymphocyte infiltrate and thyroid impairment, caused by various cell- and antibody-mediated immune processes. Viral infections have been suggested as possible environmental triggers, but conclusive data are not available. We analyzed the presence and transcriptional state of human herpesvirus 6 (HHV-6) in thyroid fine needle aspirates (FNA) and peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) from 34 HT patients and 28 controls, showing that HHV-6 DNA prevalence (82% vs. 10%, p≤0.001) and viral load were significantly increased in FNA from HT patients, and thyrocytes from HT FNA displayed a 100..
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Funding Acknowledgements
This work was supported in part by grants from the University of Ferrara (FAR). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.