A new autoantibody was detected by immunoprecipitation in the serum of 21 patients with chronic active hepatitis. The antibody reacted against a soluble cytosolic antigen in liver. The antibody was organ specific but not species specific and was therefore called anti-liver cytosol antibody Type 1 (anti-LC1). In seven of 21 cases, no other autoantibody was found; the remaining 14 cases had anti-liver/kidney microsome antibody Type 1 (anti-LKM1). With indirect immunofluorescence, a distinctive staining pattern was observed with the seven sera with anti-LC1 and without anti-LKM1. The antibody stained the cytoplasm of hepatocytes from four different animal species and spared the cellular layer around the central veins of mouse and rat liver that we have called juxtavenous hepatocytes. The immunofluorescence pattern disappeared after absorption of sera by a liver cytosol fraction. The 14 sera with both antibodies displayed anti-LC1 immunofluorescent pattern after absorption of anti-LKM1 by the liver microsomal fraction. The anti-LC1 was found in the serum only in patients with chronic active hepatitis of unknown cause. Anti-LC1 antibody was not found in sera from 100 patients with chronic active hepatitis associated with anti-actin antibody classic chronic active hepatitis Type 1, 100 patients with primary biliary cirrhosis, 157 patients with drug-induced hepatitis and a large number of patients with liver and nonliver diseases. This new antibody was considered a second marker of chronic active hepatitis associated with anti-LKM1 (anti-LKM1 chronic active hepatitis) or autoimmune chronic active hepatitis Type 2.

Antibodies↗

PubMedDate not supplied

Cardiac involvement in HIV-related non-Hodgkin's lymphoma: a case report and short review of the literature.

We report a case of secondary heart involvement in AIDS-related primary lymphoma of the liver. A worsening dyspnea led to the diagnosis of pericardial effusion, and transesophageal echocardiography revealed the presence of large endocardial ventricular masses. Clinical suspicion of a lymphomatous origin was confirmed at the autopsy, which showed an extranodal dissemination pattern (heart, liver, intestine, and lung). In AIDS patients, both primary and secondary lymphomatous heart involvement are increasing in incidence. Clinical symptoms and signs are vague. Since the hematogenous route is the most common pattern of involvement, even extrathoracic lymphomas can present heart dissemination. Thus, it should be suspected in lymphoma patients who present with even mild aspecific heart symptoms. Appropriate imaging procedures include transesophageal echocardiography and, if possible, ECG-gated MRI. A negative transthoracic echocardiograph does not exclude the presence of myocardial tumor. Chemotherapy is only occasionally beneficial, and the prognosis remains poor.

Adult↗