Sjögren’s Syndrome News

FORT WORTH, Texas — Although salivary gland ultrasonography is not a reliable diagnostic predictor of Sjögren’s syndrome in all cases, it is more predictive among advanced or severe cases of the disease, according to a poster presentation at the Rheumatology Nurses Society Annual Conference.

Johns Hopkins Hospital has been recognized by U.S. News & World Report’s Best Hospitals Survey as the top-ranked hospital in the country for rheumatology for the 2018 to 2019 year.

Healio Rheumatology is proud to announce the launch of Rheuminations, a podcast series hosted by Adam Brown, MD, focusing on medical mysteries and other ripping yarns of the immune system gone awry.

The risk for autoimmune disease among teenage girls does not increase after they receive the quadrivalent HPV vaccine, according to findings published in the Canadian Medical Association Journal.

DESTIN, Fla. —An over-reliance on elevations in serum immunoglobin G4 concentrations, or tissue immunoglobin G4-positive plasma cell numbers, remain significant “pitfalls” in the diagnosis of immunoglobin G4-related disease, according to findings presented at the 2018 Congress of Clinical Rheumatology.

For patients with systemic lupus erythematosus, systemic sclerosis and Sjögren’s syndrome, the productivity costs due to loss of paid and unpaid work were substantial, particularly due to presenteeism and unpaid work impairments, according to findings published in Arthritis Care and Research.

The nature of the relationship that patients with systemic autoimmune rheumatic diseases have with their rheumatologist can greatly affect perceptions of — and experiences with — their medications, according to findings published in BMC Rheumatology.

BOSTON — The potential rheumatic side effects of checkpoint inhibitor therapy in patients with cancer can include arthralgia, arthritis, polymyalgia rheumatica, giant cell arteritis, myositis, sicca syndrome and systemic lupus erythematosus, and can be chronic in approximately 50% of patients, according to findings presented here.

Thirteen-valent pneumococcal conjugate vaccine is immunogenic among patients with rheumatoid arthritis and Sjögren’s syndrome who have not been treated with disease modifying anti-rheumatic drugs, according to findings published in BMC Rheumatology.

AstraZeneca has announced that MedImmune, its biologics research and development arm, will spin out a new, independent biotech company named Viela Bio, which will focus on developing medicines for severe autoimmune diseases, according to a press release.