Prevalence of Autoimmune Disease in Moyamoya Disease Patients in Western Chinese Population

The pathogenesis of moyamoya remains to be elucidated and an immunologic basis has been suggested. For gaining further insight into the pathogenesis of moyamoya, we explored the epidemiological characteristics of autoimmune disease in moyamoya disease (MMD) in Western Chinese population. Retrospective clinical characteristic analysis of patients with angiographically confirmed MMD was performed and compared with the general Chinese population. A significantly higher prevalence of autoimmune disease was observed, particularly type 1 diabetes mellitus (P<0.001, 7.0% vs 1.2%, χ2 test) and Graves disease (P<0.001, 7.0% vs 0.34%, χ2 test) in the general Chinese population. The overall prevalence of autoimmune disease in MMD was up to 31.0% (44/142). This study suggested higher overall prevalence of autoimmune disease in MMD in Western China when compared with the general Chinese population. The findings further supported that autoimmune abnormality might associate with MMD and autoimmune component to pathogenesis of moyamoya vasculopathy.