Scleritis and IgA Nephropathy

Lymphocyte Populations in the Peripheral Blood from Patients with IgA Nephropathy

“…IgA nephropathy is just a morphological type of glomerular response to an immunologically-mediated in jury, that may be due to different causes in different pa tients and in different countries. A significant increase in HLA-DRw6 antigen frequency [25], and an increased frequency of association with scleritis [26] have recently been reported by the same Japanese investigators in their patients with IgA nephropathy, and point out to some genetically determined defect of the immune response which can be peculiar to the Japanese patients.…”

IgA Nephropathy in Japan

“…Moreover, they biopsied sclera of some patients presenting with scleritis. As you may know, we pre viously reported the presence of scleritis in some patients with IgA nephropathy [33]. In the biopsy specimens of sclera [41] these authors observed the accumulation of IgA-producing plasma cells around the blood vessels, presumably not a monomeric but oligomeric IgA.…”

“…Deviations among these reports could be eliminated by using fluorescent-activated cell sorters which eliminate any variations among individual observ ers using automated cell counting [27]. These conflicting results may be explained by the difference in the stage of this disease, since it has been shown that exacerbation of IgA nephropathy was associated with the decrease in IgAbearing peripheral blood lymphocytes [33,34], That circulating levels of IgA are increased in families of patients with IgA nephropathy suggests the presence of genetic factors in IgA nephropathy [27], Moreover, de crease in IgA-specific suppressor T cell activity [35], increase in IgA-specific helper T lymphocytes [36,37], and increase in B lymphocytes [38] have been observed in patients with IgA nephropathy. However, the circulating levels of such T and B cells in family members of patients with this disease have not been fully evaluated.…”

Scleritis Associated with Glomerulonephritis

“…Nomoto et al [1] have reported the frequency of scleritis in patients with IgA nephropathy. Scleritis is an inflamma tory lesion of the eye, often associated with systemic dis eases such as rheumatoid arthritis, periarteritis nodosa, Wegener's granulomatosis, or with infectious and/or allergic disorders [2].…”