Technologies

Validated urine test for the diagnosis, monitoring and prognosis of Lupus Nephritis

Lupus nephritis (LN) is a major predictor of poor prognosis of the patients with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE). The incident rate for SLE varies from 7.4 to 159.4 cases per 100,000 people. Since renal involvement is a major complication of the disease current diagnostic of LN includes renal biopsy to confirm disease and to establish histopathological classification of the underlying renal lesion. Identification of histopathological differences is critical for establishing appropriate therapeutic interventions and for prognostic outcomes for LN. No suitable biomarkers that predict early response to therapy or forecast renal flares have been identified.

The urinary test was developed (60 active LN patients, 25 active non-LN SLE patients and 24 healthy controls) and validated (for numbers see figure legend) by researchers from the University Health Network in collaboration with the researcher from the Ontario Institute for Cancer Research. Eight (8) urinary proteins are differentially expressed in patients with proliferative and non-proliferative or chronic lesions on renal biopsy.

The validation study for some of urinary proteins presented in the figure below.

The scattered plots demonstrate the normalized concentration of adiponectin, plasminogen activator inhibitor-1 (PAI-1), interleukin 15 (IL-15), platelet factor 4 (PF4) and metalloproteinase-1 (TIMP-1). The study included SLE patients with active non-LN (ANLN, n=16, closed circles), active LN (ALN, n=33, closed triangles) and in remission (n=30, open triangles).