Role in Disease
Low neutrophil counts are termed neutropenia. This can be congenital (genetic disorder) or it can develop later, as in the case of aplastic anemia or some kinds of leukemia. It can also be a side-effect of medication, most prominently chemotherapy. Neutropenia makes an individual highly susceptible to infections. Neutropenia can be the result of colonization by intracellular neutrophilic parasites.
In alpha 1-antitrypsin deficiency, the important neutrophil enzyme elastase is not adequately inhibited by alpha 1-antitrypsin, leading to excessive tissue damage in the presence of inflammation – the most prominent one being pulmonary emphysema.
In Familial Mediterranean fever (FMF), a mutation in the pyrin (or marenostrin) gene, which is expressed mainly in neutrophil granulocytes, leads to a constitutively active acute-phase response and causes attacks of fever, arthralgia, peritonitis, and – eventually – amyloidosis.
Read more about this topic: Neutrophil Granulocyte
Famous quotes containing the words role and/or disease:
“His role was as the gentle teacher, the logical, compassionate, caring and articulate teacher, who inspired you so that you wanted to please him more than life itself.”
—Carol Lawrence, U.S. singer, star of West Side Story. Conversations About Bernstein, p. 172, ed. William Westbrook Burton, Oxford University Press (1995)
“Smoking ... is downright dangerous. Most people who smoke will eventually contract a fatal disease and die. But they don’t brag about it, do they? Most people who ski, play professional football or drive race cars, will not die—at least not in the act—and yet they are the ones with the glamorous images, the expensive equipment and the mythic proportions. Why this should be I cannot say, unless it is simply that the average American does not know a daredevil when he sees one.”
—Fran Lebowitz (b. 1950)