Antigenome Signatures as Biomarkers for Subtyping Disease Heterogeneity in Lupus Patients
Abstract
Background: Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is a heterogeneous disease for which diagnosis relies heavily on the presence of serum anti-nuclear autoantibodies (ANA). Although 70 years of research has crowned immunofluorescence staining of HEp-2 cells the golden standard for ANA detection, the unique and overlapping autoantibody specificities that can jointly produce 30 unique staining patterns remain generally unknown. Moreover, standard clinical assay kits in a recent study failed to detect measurable ANA in 5-24 percent of patients with established SLE. While technical shortcomings of ANA assay kits may underlie the absence of measurable ANA titers in some cases, there remains great disagreement among experts in the field regarding measures needed for assay optimization and standardization. Proper ANA detection is critical for diagnosis and treatment as ANA seropositive patients demonstrate increased responsiveness to therapy and are therefore preferentially recruited into clinical trials. Thus, a better molecular understanding of ANA reactivity and the patient subgroups that these autoantibodies define is acutely needed.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Jan 01, 2023
- Accession Number
- AD1201597
Entities
People
- Thomas F. Tedder
Organizations
- Duke University