Impaired anti-inflammatory action of glucocorticoid in neutrophil from patients with steroid-resistant asthma

BACKGROUND: Steroid resistant (SR) asthma is characterized by persistent airway inflammation that fails to resolve despite treatment with high doses of corticosteroids. Furthermore, SR patient airways show increased numbers neutrophils, which are less responsive to glucocorticoid. The present study seeks to determine whether dexamethasone (DEX) has different effect on neutrophils from steroid sensitive (SS) asthmatics compared to SR asthmatics. METHODS: Adults with asthma (n = 38) were classified as SR or SS based on changes in lung FEV1% following a one-month inhaled corticosteroid (ICS) treatment. Blood samples were collected from all patients during their first visit of the study. Neutrophils isolated from the blood were cultured with dexamethasone and/or atopic asthmatic serum for 18 h. The mRNA expression of mitogen-activated protein kinase phosphatase-1 (MKP-1), a glucocorticoid transactivation target, and glucocorticoid-induced transcript 1 (GLCCI1), an early marker of glucocorticoid-induced apoptosis whose expression was associated with the response to inhaled glucocorticoids in asthma , was determined by real-time PCR, and ELISA was used to assess the pro-inflammatory cytokine IL-8 levels in the supernatant. Constitutive neutrophil apoptosis was detected by flow cytometry. RESULTS: DEX significantly induced MKP-1 expression in both patients with SS and SR patients in a concentration-dependent manner, but greater induction was observed for SS patients at a low concentration (10(−6) M). Asthmatic serum alone showed no MKP-1expression, and there was impaired induction of MKP-1 by DEX in SR asthma patients. The expression of GLCCI1 was not induced in neutrophils with DEX or DEX/atopic asthmatic serum combination. Greater inhibition of IL-8 production was observed in neutrophils from patients with SS asthma treated with DEX/atopic asthmatic serum combination compared with SR asthma patients, though DEX alone showed the same effect on neutrophils from SS and SR asthma patients. Meanwhile, DEX dependent inhibition of constitutive neutrophil apoptosis was similar between SS asthma and SR asthma patients. CONCLUSIONS: DEX exerted different effects on neutrophils from patients with SS asthma and SR asthma, which may contribute to glucocorticoid insensitivity.