Urinary CD8+ T-cell counts discriminate between active and inactive lupus nephritis

Table 1 Baseline characteristics of LN patients included in the study (n = 46)

	Active LN	Without active LN
		History of LN	No history of LN
Total number	22	10	14
Women/men	19/3	7/3	13/1
Age (years, mean ± SD)	35 ± 10^*	46 ± 14	37 ± 10
SLEDAI (mean ± SD)	13 ± 3 ^{**, ##}	3 ± 2	3 ± 3
Anti-dsDNA, E/ml (median, range)	230 (3 to 1,000)^{*, ##}	5 (3 to 432)	81 (3 to 1,000)
C3 g/l (median, range)	0.54 (0.05 to 1.03)^{**, ##}	1.13 (0.54 to 1.48)	0.99 (0.31 to 1.43)
C4 g/l (median, range)	0.08 (0.03 to 0.48)^*	0.23 (0.04 to 0.30)^$	0.12 (0.05 to 0.24)
Previous biopsy proven LN (yes/no)	9/13	10/0	0/14
Serum creatinine µmol/l	94 ± 78^#	80 ± 26	62 ± 13
Urinary analysis
Proteinuria g/24 h (mean ± SD)	2.8 ± 3.2^{**, ##}	0.3 ± 0.3^$,$	0.0 ± 0.1
Dysmorphic erythrocytes in %	36 %	0.%	0.%
CD4⁺T-cells/ml (median, range)	128 (0 to 1,250)^{**, ##}	9 (0 to 63)	0 (0 to 136)
CD8⁺T-cells/ml (median, range)	177 (0 to 1,388)^{**, ##}	13 (0 to 118)	17 (0 to 92)

The patients were sub-grouped into biopsy proven LN (n = 22) and patients without active LN (n = 24). The patients without active LN were further sub-grouped into patients with biopsy proven LN in the past (n = 10) and patients without renal involvement (n = 14). Significant differences between patients with active LN and patients with biopsy proven LN in the past without current activity are indicated (P <0.05 = *, P <0.005 = **). Significant differences between active LN and patients without renal involvement are indicated (P <0.05 =^#, P <0.005 =^##). Significant differences between patients with biopsy proven LN in the past without current activity and patients without renal involvement are indicated (P <0.05 =^$, P <0.005 =^$$).

ISSN: 1478-6362