Infection-related rheumatic syndromes
Renuka Nayak, MD, PhD
University of California, San Francisco (UCSF)
San Francisco, CA, United States
Disclosure(s): No financial relationships with ineligible companies to disclose
Bacterial infections have long been known to trigger autoimmune conditions with substantial morbidity, including acute rheumatic fever (ARF) and rheumatic heart disease (RHD), and now with new perspectives on post-streptococcal sequelae. While antibiotics have decreased incidence in Western nations, it is estimated there are over 300,000 cases annually, especially in developing countries. There is a new perspective and focus on post-infectious sequelae in the US, Europe, and worldwide with renewed interest in eradication of ARF/RHD and development of a streptococcal and other vaccines. In this session, we will review the current state-of-the-art understanding of these post-streptococcal conditions, and review recent translational studies that have documented urinary bacterial dysbiosis, which results in biofilm with curli amyloid-DNA complexes, and their contribution to lupus flares. At the interface of intestinal dysbiosis and infection, intestinal blooms of a common anaerobic gut commensal, increase intestinal permeability (i.e., gut leak), with release of bacterial antigens implicated in the clinical flares that plague lupus patients, and many other rheumatic or autoimmune diseases. The appreciation of these conditions and translational research with clinical application on how molecular mimicry and microbiome alike can remold our perspectives on the contributors to autoimmune rheumatic disease will be addressed in this session.
Speaker: MADELEINE CUNNINGHAM, PhD – University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center
Speaker: Gregg Silverman – NYU School of Medicine
Speaker: Roberto Caricchio, MD – University of Massachusetts Chan Medical School
