C-reactive protein and ground-glass opacity as predictors for intractable interstitial lung disease in patients with systemic sclerosis under cyclophosphamide treatment regardless of concomitant glucocorticoids

The phenotype of mixed connective tissue disease patients having associated interstitial lung disease

OBJECTIVE

We aimed to compare two matched populations of patients with MTCD with and without associated ILD and to identify predictive factors for ILD progression and severity.

METHODS

This international multicenter retrospective study (14 tertiary hospitals), included MCTD patients who fulfilled at least one historical MCTD classification criteria. ILD was defined by the presence of typical chest high-resolution computed tomography (HRCT) abnormalities. Factors associated with ILD were assessed at baseline. Long-term progressive ILD was assessed in MCTD-ILD patients with multiple forced vital capacity (FVC) measurements.

RESULTS

300 patients with MCTD were included. Mean age at diagnosis was 39.7 ± 15.4 years and 191 (63.7%) were women. Mean follow-up was 7.8 ± 5.5 years. At baseline, we identified several factors associated with ILD presence: older age (p = 0.01), skin thickening (p = 0.03), upper gastro-intestinal (GI) symptoms (p<0.001), FVC <80% (p<0.0001), diffusing capacity for carbon monoxide <80% (p<0.0001), anti-topoisomerase antibodies (p = 0.01), SSA/Ro antibodies (p = 0.02), cryoglobulinemia (p = 0.04) and elevated C-reactive protein (p<0.001). Patients with MTCD-ILD were more likely to be treated with synthetic immunosuppressant agents (p<0.001) in particular mycophenolate mofetil (p = 0.03). Digital ulcers (DU) were identified as a risk factor for FVC decline >10%. During follow-up mortality was higher in the MTCD-ILD group (p<0.001).

CONCLUSION

In this large international cohort of patients with MTCD, we identified different factors associated with ILD. Our findings also provide evidence that MCTD-ILD patients have increased mortality and that DU are associated with progressive lung disease.

Retrospective comparative study of the efficacy of JAK inhibitor (tofacitinib) in the treatment of systemic sclerosis-associated interstitial lung disease

The oral Janus kinases inhibitor (JAKi) has improved the management of skin manifestations in systemic sclerosis (SSc), and our study aimed to explore the efficacy of non-selective JAKi tofacitinib in ameliorating interstitial lung disease (ILD) in the patients with SSc. The hospitalization data of the SSc-ILD patients from April 2019 to April 2021 were collected, and the changes of pulmonary function and the radiological findings in pulmonary high-resolution CT (HRCT) from the 9 patients who received tofacitinib for at least 6 months and a matched group of 35 SSc-ILD patients treated with conventional immunosuppressants or glucocorticoids, were compared and analyzed. There were no significant differences in demographic data and clinical characteristics between the tofacitinib-treated group (tofa-group) and the matched group. However, in the tofa-group, the changes in serum lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) concentration and serum interleukin-6 levels were significantly lower than those in the matched group. Moreover, the tofa-group showed amelioration in decreased diffusing capacity of the lung for carbon monoxide (DLCO) (62.05 ± 9.47 vs. 66.61 ± 12.39, p = 0.046), reductions in ground-glass attenuation involvement (1.00 ± 0.86 vs. 0.33 ± 0.50, p = 0.024) and irregular pleural thickening (1.33 ± 0.50 vs. 0.67 ± 0.51, p = 0.004) in pulmonary HRCTs, alleviated modified Rodnan skin score (mRSS) of skin sclerosis (9.22 ± 3.81 vs. 7.11 ± 3.92, p = 0.048), and reduced HRCT scores of pulmonary fibrosis (15.00 ± 3.87 vs. 12.66 ± 4.92, p = 0.009). Logistic regression analysis showed that the involvement of ground-glass attenuation (OR 11.43) and the add-on therapy of tofacitinib (OR 9.98) were the relevant factors in the amelioration of HRCT. Our results indicate that the use of JAKi (tofacitinib) may be relevant to significant improvement of the sclerosis and early radiological abnormalities in SSc-ILD patients. Further studies are needed to confirm these findings and to explore its efficacy more precisely. Key Points • The currently available therapies for SSc-ILD have limited therapeutic benefits. • The add-on therapy of the oral JAK inhibitor is available in the real world. • The tofacitinib was promising in the improvement of the sclerosis and early radiological abnormalities in SSc-ILD patients.