Patients with oral erosive and cutaneous lichen planus may have antibodies directed against the chronic ulcerative stomatitis protein antigen of 70-kDa.

OBJECTIVE The aim of this study is to verify whether stratified epithelium-specific antinuclear antibodies are present in the sera of patients with erosive oral lichen planus and cutaneous lichen planus. METHODS We studied the pre-immune and immune serum of a rabbit immunized with a peptide corresponding to the N-terminus of the 70-kDa antigen chronic ulcerative stomatitis protein; sera from two patients, one with oral erosive lichen planus and one with cutaneous lichen planus who presented stratified epithelium-specific antinuclear antibodies at high titer; and a third serum from a patient with cutaneous lichen planus without stratified epithelium-specific antinuclear antibodies. RESULTS We demonstrated that the protein bands recognized by the serum of the rabbit immunized with an epitope of chronic ulcerative stomatitis protein co-migrated by SDS-PAGE with the protein bands recognized by the serum of a patient affected by oral erosive lichen planus and by the serum of a patient with cutaneous lichen planus, both containing antibodies directed against a 70-kDa antigen. CONCLUSIONS Our results confirm that antibodies specifically directed against the chronic ulcerative stomatitis protein are not a distinctive marker of chronic ulcerative stomatitis, but may also be detected in oral erosive and cutaneous lichen planus.