Anti-Sm antibodies in the classification criteria of systemic lupus erythematosus

Joyce J B C van Beers; Marco W J Schreurs

doi:10.1016/j.jtauto.2022.100155

Anti-Sm antibodies in the classification criteria of systemic lupus erythematosus

J Transl Autoimmun. 2022 Apr 13:5:100155. doi: 10.1016/j.jtauto.2022.100155. eCollection 2022.

Authors

Joyce J B C van Beers¹, Marco W J Schreurs²

Affiliations

¹ Central Diagnostic Laboratory, Maastricht University Medical Center, Maastricht, the Netherlands.
² Laboratory of Medical Immunology, Department of Immunology, Erasmus MC, University Medical Center Rotterdam, the Netherlands.

Abstract

Systemic lupus erythematosus is characterized by autoantibodies and immune complex deposition. Several autoantibodies against mainly nuclear autoantigens have been described. One of these nuclear autoantigens is the Smith antigen. In this review, we focus on the position of autoantibodies against the Smith antigen in the classification criteria, the characteristics of the antigen, the production of anti-Smith antibodies in SLE and we discuss the different test methods available, together with their pitfalls, to detect these autoantibodies.

Keywords: Classification criteria; Smith antigen; Systemic lupus erythematosus.