Thesis (M.Sc.) - Cairo University - Faculty of Medicine - Department of Rheumatology and Rehabilitation

Introduction: Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is an autoimmune disorder with multi-organ involvement. The continuation of inflammation in lupus could be attributed to failure of the resolution process due to presence of pro- inflammatory molecules such as leptin leading to progression and flares of lupus. Objective: To evaluate the serum levels of leptin in patients with sys-temic lupus erythematosus (SLE) and correlate their levels with disease activity and some disease parameters. Methods: Forty female SLE patients and twenty healthy women were evaluated. Patients were diagnosed according to the American College of Rheumatology (ACR) revised criteria for SLE. All patients were subjected to full history taking, thorough clinical examination, assessment of disease activity using SLEDAI and some laboratory investigations including serum leptin level (pg/ml) assessed by Enzyme Linked Immunosorbent Assay (ELISA). Patients were divided into two groups, the first with active SLE and the second with inactive SLE. Patients with SLEDAI {u2265}3 were considered active. Results: There was a significant statistically difference in serum leptin levels between SLE patients and controls (6229.65 vs 2962.30 pg/ml, P< 0.001). There were significant statistical correlations of serum leptin with BMI (P<0.001) and total cholesterol (P=0.014) in SLE patients. No statistical significant difference in levels of serum leptin was noted between active and inactive SLE groups (P=0.344). There was no significant correlation between serum leptin and disease activity measured by SLEDAI in SLE patients (P=0.310) Conclusion: Patients with SLE had elevated serum leptin levels. High leptin levels didn't seem to reflect the activity of the disease assessed by SLEDAI. In addition, there were significant statistical correlations of serum leptin with BMI and total cholesterol of SLE patients

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