Rheumatologists prescribe rituximab for induction and maintenance treatment for anti-neutrophil cytoplasm antibody (ANCA) associated vasculitides (AAV). Maintenance treatment typically employs fixed-schedule dosing, but in the recent maintenance of remission using rituximab in systemic ANCA-associated vasculitis II (MAINRITSAN2) trial, researchers from the French Vasculitis Study Group examined whether individually tailored maintenance dosing might work better. “The…
SAN DIEGO—At the 2017 ACR/ARHP Annual Meeting this past November, three researchers discussed the latest ANCA-associated vasculitis (AAV) research, including studies on AAV pathogenesis, therapies and remission maintenance. In the Philip Hench, MD, Memorial Lecture, J. Charles Jennette, MD, chair in pathology and laboratory medicine at the University of Carolina at Chapel Hill in Chapel…
A recent study examined the relationship between increased BMI and antineutrophil cytoplasmic antibody–associated vasculitis treatment with glucocorticoids. The results: Weight gain was independently associated with reductions in disease activity, increased glucocorticoid exposure and randomization to rituximab. The most significant increases in BMI occurred during the first six months of treatment, and newly diagnosed patients were more likely to experience an increase in BMI…
NEW YORK (Reuters Health)—Compared with cyclophosphamide, rituximab treatment poses less malignancy risk in patients with antineutrophil cytoplasmic antibody (ANCA)-associated vasculitis (AAV), European researchers report. Dr. Emma E. van Daalen of Leiden University Medical Center in the Netherlands tells Reuters Health, “Previous studies reported an increased malignancy risk in patients with AAV, which has been associated…
A variety of immune and nonimmune pathophysiologic mechanisms causing the disruption of alveolar capillaries with bleeding into the alveolar spaces can lead to diffuse alveolar hemorrhage (DAH). Immune-mediated mechanisms can cause DAH with or without the presence of capillaritis. The antineutrophil cytoplasmic antibody (ANCA)–associated vasculitis (AAV) syndromes—granulomatosis with polyangiitis (GPA) and microscopic polyangiitis (MPA)—are the…
New research recommends that doctors test the sera of patients with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis for anti-neutrophil cytoplasmic antibodies (ANCA), as well as closely monitor this population for signs of lung vasculitis…
A case report
Diagnosis, treatment and management of refractory gastrointestinal hemorrhage in a patient with GPA
Studies focused on role of the immune system in disease development, and contributing genetic and environmental factors, may elicit better therapeutic approaches to small- and large-vessel vasculitis
Rituximab established as the drug of choice in patients with severe disease relapse, though cyclophosphamide may still play an important role for some patients, say rheumatologists