Serum antibody level against GroEL type heat-shock protein of Campylobacter jejuni in patients with Guillain-Barre syndrome

Recently there has been an increase in the number of cases reported of Guillain-Barre syndrome (GBS) developed after Campylobacter jejuni infection. To investigate the role of a C. jejuni GroEL-type heat-shock protein (CjHsp60) in the infection and induction of GBS, we examined the antibody level against CjHsp60 in 27 human sera, including GBS and non-GBS patients, by an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. Sera from patients with C. jejuni infection, despite the development of GBS, had a higher titer of anti- CjHsp60 antibody than those of patients without the infection and healthy control subjects. The patients with C. jejuni infection followed by GBS had slightly higher levels of this antibody than did the patients with infection who did not develop GBS, but there was no statistical significance. In conclusion, CjHsp60 is found to be one of the major immunogenic antigens in actual C. jejuni infection, but no evidence that supports the direct relationship between this protein and C. jejuni-associated GBS was found in this study.