Autoantibodies Profile in the Sera of Patients with Sjogren]s Syndrome: The ANA Evaluation—A Homogeneous, Multiplexed System

BACKGROUND Flow-based, multiplex bead arrays (MBA) have been developed for a variety of applications including the detection of antibodies to extractable nuclear antigens (ENA). It offers a rapid and sensitive method to assess multiple analyses in a single tube/well. PURPOSE To evaluate the Athena Multi-Lyte ANA Test System utilizes Luminex Corporation's MBA technology for the detection of antinuclear antibodies (ANA) and ENA antibodies in the sera of patients with Sjogren's syndrome (SS). METHODS MBA assay was used to detect ANA and ENA antibodies in the sera of 37 patients with SS and 96 sera from healthy subjects. RESULTS All patients were women. Their mean age was 48.7 years and the mean disease duration was 7.27 years. ANA was found in 3 (3%) sera of healthy subjects by the AtheNA system and in 2 (2%) sera by the ELISA kit. A 99% concordance between the 2 assays was found. A 94.6% concordance between the 2 assays was found by testing the sera of patients with SS for ANA. By the AtheNA system, none of the sera of 37 patients with SS had autoantibodies reacting with Sm, Jo-1, dsDNA or histones. Anti-RNP antibody was found in 5.4% of the sera and 2.7% of the sera reacted with Scl-70 and histones. Anti-SS/A and anti-SS/B were identified in 84 and 76% of the sera, respectively. CONCLUSION The AtheNa Multi-Lyte ANA Test System offers a sensitive and specific result for the detection of ANA and ENA antibodies in the sera of patients with SS.