[Antiphospholipid syndrome in patients with systemic connective tissue diseases].

The present study evaluates the incidence of antiphospholipid antibody syndrome (APS) in systemic rheumatic diseases patients with anticardiolipin antibodies. Clinical presentations of systemic rheumatic diseases in patients with or without APS are examined as well. The data from 242 consecutive patients suffering from rheumatoid arthritis (158 pts), systemic erythematoid lupus (53 pts), or systemic sclerosis (31 pts) are studied. Enzyme immunoassay test for IgG-anticardiolipin antibodies was performed for all patients. The IgG-anticardiolipin antibodies were found in 38 (15.7%) patients. There were 16 (30.2%) patients in erythematoid lupus group, 9 (29%) patients in systemic sclerosis group, and 13 (8.2%) patients in rheumatoid arthritis group. The diagnosis of secondary APS according to classificational criteria (1998) was confirmed in 14 (36.8%) from 38 seropositive patients: ten patients (62.5%) in lupus group, 2 (22.2%) patients in systemic sclerosis group, and 2 (15.4%) patients in rheumatoid arthritis group were found as APS patients. The majority of these patients were female (92.9%). These patients were younger as compared with systemic rheumatic diseases patients without APS (p=0.005). There was no significant difference found between APS patients and patients without APS in respect to neither duration of primary disease, nor disease activity, nor course of the disease. There were significantly more cases of fibrotic heart valves (p=0.028), and thrombocytopenia (p=0.002), and livedo reticularis (p=0.058) in APS group.