Prevalence of autoantibody patterns in a group of patients with early scleroderma

Summary Background. Scleroderma is traditionally classified into two forms with different clinical expression: localized and diffused. An early variant has been described that is distinguished in three different “subsets” characterized by the constant presence of Raynaud phenomenon associated or not with anatomic alterations in the microcirculation detectable by nailfold videocapillaroscopy and/or the presence of autoantibodies (anti centromere or anti topoisomerase I): subset (1): autoantibodies plus microcirculation alterations; subset (2): autoantibodies, in the absence of microcirculation alterations; subset (3): microcirculation alterations, in the absence of autoantibodies. Methods. Our study was conducted on a group of 89 subjects with a positive history for Raynaud’s phenomenon enrolled at the Interdisciplinary Interdepartmental Reference Center for Early Diagnosis of Scleroderma Ulcers (CRIIS) of “Sandro Pertini” hospital in Rome, with the aim of defining the subset to which they belonged basing on the positivity to nailfold videocapillaroscopy and/or the presence of specific autoantibody markers. Results and conclusions. We identified: 25 patients with anti-CENP B antibodies, two of which were also positive for anti-SSA antibodies; 7 with anti-Topoisomerase I antibodies, of which one was also positive for anti-SS-A and another for both anti-Ro60 and anti-snRNP. These patients were classified as subset 1 or 2. Three patients were positive for anti-PM/Scl-100 antibodies in addition to other autoantibody markers: one resulted also positive for anti-snRNP, the others for both anti-SS-A and anti-Ro52.