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Background: The standard-of-care protocol, based on plasma exchanges, high-dose intravenous immunoglobulin and optimization of maintenance immunosuppression, can slow down the evolution of antibody-mediated rejection (AMR), but with high interindividual variability. Identification of a reliable predictive tool of the response to AMR treatment is a mandatory step for personalization of the follow-up strategy and to guide second-line therapies., Methods: Interrogation of the electronic databases of 2 French university hospitals (Lyon and Strasbourg) retrospectively identified 81 renal transplant recipients diagnosed with AMR without chronic lesions (cg score ≤1) at diagnosis and for whom a follow-up biopsy had been performed 3-6 months after initiation of therapy., Results: The evolution of humoral lesions on follow-up biopsy (disappearance versus persistence versus progression) correlated with the risk for allograft loss (logrank test, P = .001). Patients with disappearance of humoral lesions had ∼80% graft survival at 10 years. The hazard ratio for graft loss in multivariate analysis was 3.91 (P = .04) and 5.15 (P = .02) for patients with persistence and progression of lesions, respectively. The non-invasive parameters classically used to follow the intensity of humoral alloimmune response (evolution of immunodominant DSA mean fluorescence intensity) and the decline of renal graft function (estimated glomerular filtration rate decrease and persistent proteinuria) showed little clinical value to predict the histological response to AMR therapy., Conclusion: We conclude that invasive monitoring of the evolution of humoral lesions by the mean of follow-up biopsy performed 3-6 months after the initiation of therapy is an interesting tool to predict long-term outcome after AMR treatment., (© The Author(s) 2022. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the ERA.)

Objectives: Only a third of patients with eosinophilic granulomatosis with polyangiitis (EGPA) are ANCA-positive, mainly directed against MPO. ANCA directed against PR3 are rarely found in EGPA. We aimed to examine the significance of PR3-ANCA in EGPA., Methods: We set up a retrospective European multicentre cohort including 845 patients. Baseline characteristics and outcomes were analysed and compared according to ANCA status., Results: ANCA status was available for 734 patients: 508 (69.2%) ANCA-negative, 210 (28.6%) MPO-ANCA and 16 (2.2%) PR3-ANCA. At baseline, PR3-ANCA patients, compared with those with MPO-ANCA and ANCA-negative, less frequently had active asthma (69% vs 91% and 93%, P = 0.003, respectively) and peripheral neuropathy (31% vs 71% and 47%, P < 0.0001), more frequently had cutaneous manifestations (63% vs 38% and 34%, P = 0.03) and pulmonary nodules (25% vs 10% and 8%, P = 0.046), and lower median eosinophil count (1450 vs 5400 and 3224/mm3, P < 0.0001). Vasculitis relapse-free survival was shorter for PR3-ANCA (hazard ratio 6.05, P = 0.005) and MPO-ANCA patients (hazard ratio 1.88, P = 0.0002) compared with ANCA-negative patients., Conclusion: PR3-ANCA EGPA patients differ from those with MPO-ANCA and negative ANCA, and share clinical features with granulomatosis with polyangiitis. This suggests that PR3-ANCA EGPA could be a particular form of PR3-ANCA-associated vasculitis., (© The Author(s) 2020. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the British Society for Rheumatology. All rights reserved. For permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oup.com.)