Alice Melão,  —

The Vasculitis Foundation announced the 2018 awardees of its one-year grants, amounting a total of $160,000. The three project winners were selected from 20 applications from research teams around the world. To date, the Vasculitis Foundation has granted more than $2.5 million for a total of 49 research studies. Among…

Compared to patients with inflammatory bowel disorders, the safety and efficacy of azathioprine treatment in ANCA-associated vasculitis (AAV) patients is not affected by lower TPMT protein activity, researchers found. The study, “Thiopurine methyltransferase genotype and activity cannot predict outcomes of azathioprine maintenance therapy for antineutrophil cytoplasmic antibody…

The more white blood cell precursors that an ANCA-associated vasculitis (AAV) patient has when diagnosed, the worse their disease, a South Korean study reports. Levels of the precursors, known as immature granulocytes, can help doctors identify which patients with two forms of AAV are likely to have relapses, the researchers…

ANCA-associated vasculitis (AAV) may be associated with rare mutations in the alpha-1 antitrypsin (AAT) protein, a new case report suggests. The study, “Fulminant hepatic failure in the setting of progressive ANCA-associated vasculitis associated with a rare alpha-1 antitrypsin phenotype, ‘PiEE‘,” was published in the journal BMJ…

Patients with ANCA-associated vasculitis might develop acute thrombocytopenia — extremely low levels of platelets circulating in the blood — after being treated with Rituxan (rituximab), a case study from Japan reported for a first time. While rare, physicians should be aware of this potential side effect so as to detect…

Eosinophilic granulomatosis with polyangiitis (EGPA) may manifest as as a painful, progressive skin rash, and be associated with secondary cryoglobulinemia — a condition where abnormal proteins in the blood clump together at low temperatures — a new case report shows. While rare, it is critical that these conditions are recognized…

Granulomatosis with polyangiitis (GPA) may sometimes manifest as facial paralysis and ear pain — a potentially challenging diagnosis, according to the case report of a teenage patient. The study, “Granulomatosis with polyangiitis presenting as facial nerve palsy in a teenager,” appeared in the International Journal of Pediatric…

A common antibiotic used to treat a variety of bacterial infections may trigger autoantibodies against the proteinase 3 protein — one of the two most common autoantibodies in ANCA-associated vasculitis (AAV) patients — and lead to blood vessel damage to the skin, according to a…

Diagnosing ANCA-associated vasculitis in children and adolescents can pose difficulties for doctors, given its rarity and varied clinical course, researchers say. In a new study, investigators described the case of a teenager with MPO-positive vasculitis and severe pulmonary and renal symptoms, who went without a diagnosis for about four years. The…

An increase in the production of ANCA antibodies may sometimes be associated with Sweet’s syndrome, a rare condition characterized by painful skin lesions, a case report shows. The study, “Sweet’s Syndrome Mimicking ANCA-Associated Vasculitis,” was published in The American Journal of Medicine. Sweet’s syndrome, also known…