[Practical results of monitoring pregnancy in women with systemic lupus erythematosus].

Background: The authors dealt with the urgent problem under what conditions it is possible to achieve in a woman with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) or another collagenosis, or secondary antiphospholipid syndrome (APS) a favourable outcome of pregnancy and the delivery of a healthy infant.

Methods And Results: The investigation comprised 23 women incl. 20 with SLE, two with the mixed form of a diffuse connective tissue disease (MCTD) and one with Sjögren's syndrome of the primary type.

Herpes viruses in multicase families with rheumatoid arthritis.

Objective: To investigate the rate and extent of infection by Epstein-Barr virus (EBV), cytomegalovirus, and herpesvirus 6 in families (affected and nonaffected members) with multiple cases of rheumatoid arthritis (RA).

Methods: Viral DNA was detected by polymerase chain amplification in cells from saliva and peripheral blood. Human leukocyte antigen pedigrees were characterized.

[Determination of antiphospholipid antibodies in serum using ELISA].

The authors compare two ELISA methods for the assessment of antiphospholipid antibodies, classes IgG and IgM, in serum: ELISA Pin Plate System ALPHA DIALAB Co. and the ELISA method developed in the Research Institute of Rheumatic Diseases. Both methods use cardiolipin as antigen.

[Antineutrophil cytoplasmic antibodies--ANCA].

Antibodies against cytoplasm of neutrophil leucocytes (ANCA) with a high sensitivity are found in idiopathic necrotizing vasculitis and idiopathic glomerulonephritis with formation of sickles (IGS). C-ANCA are directed against the myeloid lysosomal enzyme--proteinase 3 and are found above all in Wegener's granulomatosis and microscopic polyarteritis. P-ANCA are directed mainly against myeloperoxidase, less against leucocytic elastase or lactoferrin and are found above all in microscopic polyarteritis, IGS, polyarteritis nodosa or Churg-Strauss syndrome.

[Why are there anti-cardiolipin antibodies in patients with infectious mononucleosis and in patients with systemic lupus erythematosus?].

The phenomenon of anticardiolipin antibodies (aCL) is in recent years the subject of interest as it is connected with manifestations of thromboses at different sites, with repeated miscarriages in pregnant women and with thrombocytopenia. As compared with the original finding in patients with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), the authors find they are present also in infection with the Epstein-Barr virus--in patients with acute infectious mononucleosis, in as many as 61% of a total number of 77 examined patients; in a group of 60 patients with SLE in 41% and in a group of healthy controls in 3.9%.

Transbilayer redistribution of phosphatidylserine in erythrocytes of a patient with autoerythrocyte sensitization syndrome (psychogenic purpura).

We have investigated a female patient with autoerythrocyte sensitization syndrome (AES syndrome), having a positive skin response to her own red blood cells (RBC) and to phosphatidylserine (PS). Using 2,4,6-trinitrobenzenesulfonic acid (TNBS), bee venom phospholipase A2 and merocyanine 540 binding, we have demonstrated that in RBC of patient more than 50% of PS is redistributed into the outer leaflet of the plasma membrane. Using homologous RBC from a healthy donor we were able to induce transbilayer PS redistribution by incubation with the patient plasma.