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Lymphocyte populations and cytokine concentrations in pericardial fluid from a systemic lupus erythematosus patient with cardiac tamponade
| The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below. |
Pericardial involvement is the most common cardiovascular complication in systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE).1 The clinical picture varies from subclinical pericardial effusion and classic acute pericarditis to cardiac tamponade.1 2 Immunological studies of pericardial fluid (PF) have been limited to determination of autoantibodies, complements and immune complexes.3 4 To further study the pathogenic mechanisms involved in lupus pericarditis we examined the lymphocytic populations and cytokine concentration pattern in PF and peripheral blood (PB) from a SLE patient with cardiac tamponade.
We report a case of a 38 year old man with SLE diagnosed in December
1995 when he presented with polyarthritis, photosensitivity, oral
ulcers, nephritis, non-hemolytic anaemia, positive ANA, increase of
anti-dsDNA and hypocomplementaemia. The patient improved with corticosteroid and intravenous cyclophosphamide treatment. However, on
18 June 1997 he presented with syncope, hypotension (80/40 mm Hg), a
tachycardia, jugular vein distension and cardiomegaly. The two
dimensional echocardiogram showed a large pericardial effusion with
right atria and ventricle
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