Smoking and behçet's disease

PubMedID: 11147770It has recently been claimed that some of the symptoms in patients with Behçet's disease (BD) can be activated after the patient has stopped smoking. In this study we investigated the effect of smoking on the symptoms of Behçet's disease. Fifty asymptomatic current smokers (CS) who promised to stop smoking (group 1) and 60 current non-smokers (NS) (group 2) (21 of them ex-smokers) with BD were examined at the beginning and a week later for the presence of symptoms of BD. Forty-seven of the 50 CS completed the study. Oral aphthous ulcers were observed in 31 (65.9%) of them at the end of the study period. Besides oral aphthous lesions, genital ulcers were detected in two and erythema nodosum in two other patients. Only 15 (25%) group 2 patients developed oral aphthous ulcers during the study period. The difference between the frequencies of oral aphthous lesions in these groups was significant (p = 0.0002). We concluded that cessation of cigarette smoking can activate the mucocutaneous symptoms, especially oral aphthous lesions, in patients with BD

Serum soluble CD23 (sCD23) measurement as a parameter for clinical activity in systemic lupus erythematosus

Purpose: CD23 is known as low affinity receptor for IgE on a variety of human cells and it can be cleaved in soluble fragments (sCD23). Elevated serum sCD23 levels have already been reported in patients with chronic B cell leukemia, systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), Primary Sjogren's syndrome (SS), rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and allergic diseases. Purpose of this study was to investigate the sCD23 levels in active and inactive patients with SLE in order to find out its importance as a parameter for activity of the disease. Methods: Serum sCD23 levels were measured in 21 active (19 female, 2 male; mean age: 29.2) and 21 inactive (18 female, 3 male, mean age: 30.6) patients with SLE and 29 healthy controls (22 female, 7 male; mean age: 35.3) by using enzyme immunoassay (ELISA). Results: sCD23 levels were found to be significantly increased in patients with active SLE (mean: 5.29 ± 5.61 ng/ml; SE:1.2) when compared with those of inactive SLE patients (mean: 1.42 ± 1.92 ng/ml; SE:0.42) and healthy controls (mean: 0.87 ± 0.93; SE:0.17); (p = 0.0004 and 0.0001 respectively). There was no significant difference between sCD23 levels of inactive SLE group and healthy controls (p = 0.83). Conclusion: Raised sCD23 levels in active SLE may represent B cell hyperractivity in active disease and sCD23 level can be used as a parameter for clinical activity in SLE