News

Karen H. Costenbader, MD, is the new chairwoman of the medical-scientific advisory council of the Lupus Foundation of America (LFA). Chairman of the LFA’s national board of directors, Conrad Gehrmann, announced the appointment earlier this week. Costenbader will lead the multi-disciplinary group of lupus experts to address unmet needs…

Rituxan (rituximab) could be a valid alternative to standard of care in systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) patients with neurological and psychiatric manifestations, a new Italian case report shows. The research, “Severe neuropsychiatric systemic lupus erythematosus successfully treated with rituximab: an alternative to standard of care,” was published in…

The United Kingdom’s first set of guidelines for care of patients with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) has been published by researchers at the University of Birmingham. The guidelines produced by the British Society for Rheumatology were published in the journal Rheumatology. Produced for a range of healthcare…

Patients with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) with or without lupus nephritis (LN) showed no clinical benefit when treated with Amgen‘s investigative anti-interferon-gamma antibody, AMG 811, in a Phase 1b  (NCT00818948) clinical trial. Some indicators of the disease dropped in response to the treatment, but less so in…

After realizing how many lupus patients had trouble keeping track of their medications, daily symptoms and appointments, an interdisciplinary team at the Hospital for Special Surgery (HSS) developed a mobile app called LupusMinder. After collecting real-world patient reports, the rheumatology, social work, and digital communications department at…

Poverty is associated with an accumulation of lupus damage, which leads to a higher risk of death, a study reports. The research, “The Relationship between Poverty and Mortality in Systemic Lupus Erythematosus,” was published in the journal Arthritis Care & Research. The link between socioeconomic…

Two specific variations in the genetic sequence of the glucocorticoid receptor — which determines how well glucocorticoid regulates metabolism and other key processes — were seen to markedly increase a person’s risk of systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), a study conducted in China reports. Published in the International Journal of…

Patients who have their lupus treated at more than one care facility are at higher risk of developing severe infections and other diseases, a study indicates. The researchers called the tendency to go to more than one institution “fragmentation of treatment.” Their study, “Disease Outcomes and Care…

Lupus patients with certain antibodies are more prone to getting blood clots, but researchers might have come up with a way of preventing such clots from forming in the first place. In a new mouse study, researchers at the University of Michigan Medical School found that targeting the PSGL-1 molecule…

Good gut bacteria from yogurt may be able to reduce kidney inflammation in systemic lupus erythematosus patients — if results of a mouse study can be translated to humans, that is. Mice with lupus who ate lactobacillus bacteria had stronger anti-inflammatory immune reactions and less kidney disease than control mice, according…