Clinical correlations with disease-associated auto-antibodies in a Chinese cohort with systemic sclerosis

To the Editor: Systemic sclerosis (SSc) is an autoimmune disease characterized by progressive skin and visceral fi brosis, microvasculopathy, and autoimmunity. Circulat-ing auto-antibodies (AAbs) are detectable in 90% to 95% of patients with SSc. [1] It is reported that 60% to 80% of SSc patients are positive for anti-topoisomerase I antibody (ATA), anti-centromere antibody (ACA), and anti-RNA polymerase III antibody (ARA). [2] These three AAbs are the most prevalent SSc-associated AAbs, with high speci fi city for the diagnosis of SSc; so they have been included in the classi fi cation criteria for SSc de fi ned by the American College of Rheumatology (ACR)/European League Against Rheumatism (EULAR) in 2013. Current-ly, SSc-associated AAbs have been widely used in clinical practice, and the research on the clinical signi fi cance of AAbs is still in progress. In our present study, we analyzed the correlations between the SSc-associated auto-antibody pro fi le and clinical manifestations in a well-characterized Chinese SSc cohort. One hundred and forty-four patients between in this cross-sectional study. The inclusion criteria were as