The average level of immunoglobulin E reduces the risk of brain cancer
Last reviewed: 16.10.2021
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A moderately high level of allergic immunoglobulins reduces the likelihood of brain cancer. If the content of such antibodies in the blood is off scale, the probability of occurrence of cancer does not affect it in any way.
The connection of an allergy with cancer has been occupied by scientists for a long time. Theoretically, immunity must attack a tumor, but cancer cells have many ways to escape from an immune attack. In allergy sufferers, the immunity is in a state of increased alertness: in fact, "being on the brink", he often makes mistakes and reacts to innocuous substances. And here some time ago there was a hypothesis that an allergy, although it gives a person a lot of trouble, contributes to the timely detection of cancer cells. And the likelihood of getting cancer in an allergic person is less.
A number of statistical studies followed, but none of them was moderately rigorous to satisfy the scientific community. The main disadvantage was that in these works there was still a tangible probability of mere coincidence. Allergic signs in the immune system (for example, increased level of special antibodies) could be a consequence of anticancer therapy, in which case the delay in the growth of the tumor and the "allergy" could be explained by the action of the drugs.
Scientists from the University of Brown (USA) tried to take into account the mistakes of their predecessors and undertook one more study devoted to the effect of allergy on the appearance of gliomas, brain tumors. A sign of an allergic reaction is an increased level of IgE immunoglobulins, but in this case, the researchers did not go from one brain cancer patient to another, asking them about allergies and measuring the IgE level in the blood. Scientists have used the data of several large-scale health programs, in which about 10 thousand people took part. All of them in due time have handed over a blood on analyzes even before at them signs of any malignant tumor have shown. And now the researchers could compare the cancer statistics with the baseline level of allergic antibodies.
In an article published in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, the authors write that if the level of IgE in a person was raised to the upper limit (that is, up to 100 thousand units of antibodies per liter of blood), then the probability of brain cancer really decreased. At the same time, which is curious, if the level of antibodies was overestimated (more than 100 thousand units per liter of blood), the likelihood of glioma appearing to have no effect. The normal level of IgE in the blood is 25 thousand units. These statistics were the same for men and women and did not depend on what exactly antibodies were produced - for food or respiratory allergens. At the same time, elevated levels of antibodies did not help patients with an already entrenched tumor.
The authors emphasize that this is the first work in which the likelihood of a tumor was compared with the baseline level of allergic antibodies that the person had before the disease. Thus, it was possible to bypass possible pitfalls, such as the fact that changes in the number of immunoglobulins could be a consequence of the disease itself or its therapy.
Obtained data, of course, leave for the future an unsolved mystery related to the amount of antibodies: why a moderately elevated level of cancer reduces the likelihood of cancer, and increased unnecessarily does not.