Altered vaccine-induced immunity in children with Dravet syndrome

Abstract

Dravet syndrome (DS) is a refractory epileptic syndrome. Vaccination is the trigger of the first seizure in about 50% of cases. Fever remains a trigger of seizures during the course of the disease. We compared ex vivo cytokine responses to a combined aluminium-adjuvanted vaccine of children with DS to sex- and age-matched heathy children. Using ex vivo cytokine responses of peripheral-blood mononuclear cells and monocytes, we found that vaccine responsiveness is biased toward a proinflammatory profile in DS with a M1 phenotype of monocytes. We provide new insight into immune mechanisms associated with DS that might guide research for the development of new immunotherapeutic agents in this epilepsy syndrome.

Keywords: Dravet syndrome; cytokines; epilepsy; inflammation; monocytes.