Severe Systemic Lupus Erythematosus presentation in patient with alternative complement pathway mutations

Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is an autoimmune disease which can involve almost any organ, making its difficult therapeutic approach. Immune complex deposition can often activate complement, accounting for many of SLE clinical manifestations and laboratory findings. We present a case of a patient who presented with acute pancreatitis and acute kidney injury as onset manifestations of SLE, later developing neurological manifestations, who was successfully treated with rituximab, plasma exchange and steroids as induction therapy. Persistently low C3 level led to a genetic analysis of the complement system components. We found three polymorphisms in the alternative pathway of complement regulators (complement factor H c2669 G>T, p.Ser890Ile and c3019 G>T, p.Val1007Leu and complement factor I c.482+6 G>T), two of which have been correlated with atypical haemolytic uraemic syndrome and dense deposit disease and also complement factor H -related protein (CFHR1 and CFHR3) mutations by deletion. This raises the question whether these polymorphisms and mutations played any role in our patient’s clinical course. info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion