Polyarteritis nodosa (PAN) is the systemic necrotizing vasculitis on small and median muscular vessels. Recent studies reveal that PAN consists of classical PAN and microscopic polyangitis (MPA). MPO-ANCA, which is one of anti-neutrophil cytoplasmic antibody (ANCA), is involved in the pathogenesis of MPA. In future, by the progress of research of ANCA, the definition or criteria of systemic vas...

Granulomatosis with polyangiitis (GPA) formerly called Wegener's granulomatosis is a chronic necrotizing granulomatous inflammatory disease with systemic vasculitis involving the upper and lower respiratory tract, and kidneys. The typical histopathology is that of necrotizing granulomatous inflammation with palisading histiocytes, neutrophils, and lymphocytes. We report a case of a 57-year-old ...

Scleroderma is an autoimmune disease involving endothelial cell damage and fibroblast overproduction of extracellular matrix. Several autoantibodies present in the sera of patients with scleroderma, including anti-endothelial cell, antifibroblast, anti-matrix metalloproteinase, and antifibrillin-1 antibodies, may directly contribute to disease pathogenesis. Scleroderma also is characterized by ...

We evaluated the clinical characteristics of 41 children with chronic neutropenia based on the quantitative analysis of antineutrophil antibodies in serum by flow cytometry. According to the strength of antineutrophil antibodies, the patients were divided into 3 groups: 12 patients presented negative antibodies, 13 patients showed weak positive antibodies, and 16 patients showed strong positive...

A 60-year-old man was admitted to our clinic with dyspnea, hemoptesis, anuria, nephritic syndrome, and a positive myeloperoxidase antineutrophil cytoplasmic antibody titer. He was diagnosed with antineutrophil cytoplasmic antibody-associated vasculitis due to Wegener granulomatosis, microscopic polyangiitis, or drug induction. Unexpectedly, histopathologic examination of the kidney biopsy speci...

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE The possibility that a disorder of immunity might have a role in the mechanism of local inflammatory alterations leading to spontaneous cervical artery dissection (sCAD) has been recently advocated. METHODS We explored this hypothesis in a case-control study, including patients with sCAD (n=29) and patients with non-CAD ischemic stroke (non-CAD; n=29). Serum levels of a...