Rheumatologists reviewed the clinical and immunological data of 351 adults diagnosed with inflammatory myopathy, with the aim of determining the prevalence of antinuclear antibodies by comparing it with that of other autoantibodies:
- three-quarters of the sample were positive for antinuclear antibodies (ANA), most commonly isolated in the nucleus, and less frequently in the cytoplasmic or nucleolar regions,
- myositis-specific antibodies (MSA) and myositis-associated antibodies (MAA) were present in both ANA-positive and ANA-negative patients.
The authors highlight the complementary nature of the three assays (FAN, MSA, MAA) in the specific context of inflammatory myopathies.
