Scleroderma specific autoantibodies in rheumatoid arthritis and Sjögren's syndrome patients with interstitial lung disease: Prevalence and associations

Vasiliki Koulouri; Athanasios-Dimitrios Bakasis; Nikolaos Marketos; Kyriaki Tavernaraki; Mayra Giannelou; Haralampos M Moutsopoulos; Clio P Mavragani

doi:10.1016/j.jtauto.2022.100183

Scleroderma specific autoantibodies in rheumatoid arthritis and Sjögren's syndrome patients with interstitial lung disease: Prevalence and associations

J Transl Autoimmun. 2022 Dec 22:6:100183. doi: 10.1016/j.jtauto.2022.100183. eCollection 2023.

Authors

Vasiliki Koulouri^{1

2}, Athanasios-Dimitrios Bakasis², Nikolaos Marketos¹, Kyriaki Tavernaraki³, Mayra Giannelou⁴, Haralampos M Moutsopoulos⁵, Clio P Mavragani^{1

6}

Affiliations

¹ Department of Physiology, School of Medicine, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Greece.
² Department of Pathophysiology, School of Medicine, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Greece.
³ Imaging and Interventional Radiology, Sotiria General and Chest Diseases Hospital, Athens, Greece.
⁴ Department of Rheumatology, General Hospital of Athens "G. Gennimatas", Greece.
⁵ Academy of Athens, Chair Medical Sciences/Immunology, Athens, Greece.
⁶ Joint Academic Rheumatology Program, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Athens, Greece.

Abstract

Systemic sclerosis (SSc) has been classically linked to interstitial lung disease (ILD) development, often in association with specific SSc autoantibodies. In the present report, we aimed to estimate the prevalence of SSc autoantibodies in 60 seropositive RA and 41 primary SS patients complicated or not by ILD. SSc autoantibodies were determined in patients' sera by a commercial immunoblot assay. RA ILD patients displayed higher frequency of SSc-specific antibodies at strong titers compared to RA-with no lung involvement (25% vs 3.1%, p = 0.01)[OR 95% CI:10.9 (1.2-94.5)], with no differences detected between primary SS groups. These data indicate that many seropositive RA ILD patients probably represent an overlap RA/SSc entity, requiring tailored diagnostic and therapeutic approach.

Keywords: Autoantibodies; Interstitial lung disease; Rheumatoid arthritis; Systemic sclerosis.