What is it about?
The short-term outcome of myelitis in patients with lupus has been studied before. We evaluated how patients with myelitis associated to lupus fare in the long term. We show for the first time that patients with myelitis have a fatality rate of 31% at five years, mostly due to severe infection/sepsis.
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Why is it important?
We observe an unsuspected increase in fatality among patients with myelitis and lupus. While myelitis is not the cause of death, we suspect myelitis is a predictor of severe inflammation amongst these patients.
Perspectives
I hope this paper will renew interest in understanding the mechanism of myelitis, as it is possible that the cause of myelitis is also leading to increased susceptibility, or a magnified response, to infections resulting in accelerated mortality.
Sergio Iván Valdés-Ferrer
Instituto Nacional de Ciencias Médicas y Nutrición Salvador Zubirán
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Natural history of longitudinally extensive transverse myelitis in 35 Hispanic patients with systemic lupus erythematosus: good short-term functional outcome and paradoxical increase in long-term mortality, Lupus, April 2018, SAGE Publications,
DOI: 10.1177/0961203318770015.
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