Differential diagnosis of systemic lupus erythematosus and rheumatoid arthritis with complements C3 and C4 and C-reactive protein

Li,Wenhui; Li,Hui; Song,Wuqi; Hu,Yunlong; Liu,Yanhong; Da,Rong; Chen,Xiaobei; Li,Yang; Ling,Hong; Zhong,Zhaohua; Zhang,Fengmin

doi:10.3892/etm.2013.1304

Differential diagnosis of systemic lupus erythematosus and rheumatoid arthritis with complements C3 and C4 and C-reactive protein

Authors:
- Wenhui Li
- Hui Li
- Wuqi Song
- Yunlong Hu
- Yanhong Liu
- Rong Da
- Xiaobei Chen
- Yang Li
- Hong Ling
- Zhaohua Zhong
- Fengmin Zhang
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Affiliations: Department of Microbiology, Harbin Medical University, Heilongjiang Key Laboratory of Infection and Immunity and Pathogenic Biology, Harbin, Heilongjiang 150081, P.R. China, Department of Laboratory Medicine, The Second Affiliated Hospital of Harbin Medical University, Harbin, Heilongjiang 150086, P.R. China, Department of Rheumatology, The Second Affiliated Hospital of Harbin Medical University, Harbin, Heilongjiang 150086, P.R. China
Published online on: September 17, 2013 https://doi.org/10.3892/etm.2013.1304
Pages: 1271-1276

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Abstract

The aim of this study was to analyze the changes in complements C3 and C4 and C-reactive protein (CRP) in patients with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) and rheumatoid arthritis (RA), and to evaluate the role of these indices in the differential diagnosis of SLE and RA. The first 347 patients with SLE, 382 patients with RA and 66 patients with erythema nodosum were selected for the measurement of complement and CRP levels in the serum, the erythema nodosum patients were the control group. The roles of the complements and CRP in the differential diagnosis and disease activity evaluation of SLE and RA were analyzed with SPSS 13.0. Complement C3 and C4 levels were significantly reduced in patients with SLE compared with those in the control group. However, in RA patients, the CRP level was increased. In addition, the levels of complements C3 and C4 in patients with SLE were much lower than those in patients with RA and the level of CRP in RA patients was much higher than that in patients with SLE. The reduction of complement C3 levels in SLE patients, and increase of CRP and complement C4 in patients with RA were associated with a higher risk of joint pain, butterfly rash and oral ulcer. These results show that the disease activity of SLE was negatively correlated with complement C3 and C4, and the disease activity of RA was positively correlated with CRP. With the increase in disease activity, the levels of complements C3 and C4 in patients with SLE were gradually reduced and the level of CRP in patients with RA was increased. There were distinctive differences in the levels of complements C3 and C4 and CRP between SLE and RA patients. The differences are useful in disease activity evaluation and the differential diagnosis of the two diseases that have similar symptoms.

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