NEWPORT BEACH, CALIF.– Patients with discoid lupus should be checked routinely for systemic disease, but complete autoantibody studies aren’t necessary for those patients with a prior work-up and a documented negative antinuclear antibodies, according to Dr. Ruth Ann Vleugels.
“The reason why we are doing these investigations is because between 5% and up to about 20% of our discoid lupus patients can develop systemic disease,” said Dr. Vleugels of Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, Mass. Some patients don’t develop symptoms until years later, she noted.
In an interview at Skin Disease Education Foundation’s Women’s & Pediatric Dermatology Seminar, Dr. Vleugels shared her protocol for managing discoid lupus patients. She had no financial conflicts to disclose. SDEF and this news organization are owned by Frontline Medical Communications.