LAS VEGAS – New diagnostic criteria from the Systemic Lupus International Collaborating Clinics make the difficult task of diagnosing systemic lupus easier.
SLICC’s criteria are meant to supplant years-old criteria from the American College of Rheumatology. The SLICC criteria cast a wider net, without sacrificing specificity (Arthritis Rheum. 2012;64:2677-86).
SLICC coauthor Dr. Susan Manzi, chair of the department of medicine in the Allegheny Health Network and director of the Lupus Center of Excellence, both in Pittsburgh, explained how the new criteria work, and why they are an improvement.
At the conference held by Global Academy for Medical Education, she also explained why antinuclear antibody – “the lupus test” – isn’t completely reliable when diagnosing the disease.
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