Curative effect of intravitreal injection of infliximab on uveitis in rats

Objective To investigate the curative effect of intravitreal injection of infliximab on uveitis in rats.Methods Sixty Wistar rats were randomly and evenly divided into three groups:group A,group B and group C.Intravitreal injection of bovine serum albumin (BSA) in oculus sinister (OS) was conducted to induce the establishment of the model of uveitis in rats in group A and group B,rats in group C remained untouched.After the model was established,intravitreal injection of 10 g·L-1 infliximab (0.1 mL) was performed on rats in group A,rats in group B and group C were administered with normal saline (0.1 mL) in the same manner.Ocular examinations were carried out and aqueous humor was extracted at four points-in-time:preoperatively,the 7th day,14th day and 21st day postoperatively.Meanwhile,levels of tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-α) and interleukin-2 (IL-2) in the aqueous humor sample were tested by ELISA.Histopathological observation was conducted on removed experimental eyeballs at all points-in-time.Results At the 1st time-in-point,differences among levels of TNF-α and IL-2 of the three groups were of no statistical significance (all P0.05).At the 2nd time-in-point,no significant difference was found between levels of TNF-α and IL-2 of group A and group B(all P0.05),but levels of TNF-α and IL-2 of group A and group B were significantly higher than those of group C (all P0.05).At the 3rd and 4th time-in-points,TNF-α level of group A were (331.49±74.40)ng·L-1 and (164.59±69.49)ng·L-1,while the level of group B were (589.15±113.45)ng·L-1 and (347.48±84.38)ng·L-1 (both P0.01);IL-2 level of group A were (35.74±14.87)ng·L-1 and (31.58±16.94)ng·L-1,while the level of group B were (74.16±18.04)ng·L-1 and (69.48±20.73)ng·L-1 (both P0.01).At the 4th time-in-point,inflammatory response in rats in group A was obvious more mild than that in group B.Conclusion Infliximab can effectively inhibit the production of TNF-α and IL-2 in aqueous humor of rats with uveitis and alleviate ocular inflammation and pathological lesion,thus it has a significant curative effect on uveitis.