AUTHOR=Feng Xinzhe , Tong Wenwen , Li Jia , Xu Yihong , Zhu Shanbang , Xu Weidong 

TITLE=Diagnostic value of anti-Kaiso autoantibody in axial spondyloarthritis

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Immunology

VOLUME=Volume 14 - 2023

YEAR=2023

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/immunology/articles/10.3389/fimmu.2023.1156350

DOI=10.3389/fimmu.2023.1156350

ISSN=1664-3224

ABSTRACT=Objective: Axial spondyloarthritis (axSpA) is a chronic rheumatic disease characterized predominantly by inflammation and progressive structural damage. Patients are often diagnosed very late, delaying the optimal period of treatment. How to diagnose axSpA early remains a major challenge, especially in non-radiographic axSpA (nr-axSpA).
Methods: To investigate the value of autoantibodies in the diagnosis of nr-axSpA and their correlation with disease clinical indicators, two pooled serum samples (7 nr-axSpA patients and 7 healthy controls) were profiled using HuProt arrays. Levels of anti-Kaiso autoantibody in axSpA patients and controls were determined using the Meso Scale Discovery (MSD) assay system. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis was carried out to evaluate the diagnostic performance of anti-Kaiso autoantibody in axSpA. Pearson correlation was used to assess the correlation between anti-Kaiso autoantibody and clinical parameters. 
Results: Seven candidate autoantibodies were present specifically in serum from the nr-axSpA patients. The levels of anti-Kaiso autoantibody were significantly higher in nr-axSpA than those in other groups. It could differentiate nr-axSpA from ankylosing spondylitis (AS), healthy controls and rheumatoid arthritis (RA). It’s level of the early stage of AS among nr-axSpA decreased when progressing to late stage. Of all the axSpA patients, serum levels of anti-Kaiso autoantibody were positively correlated with the C-reactive protein (CRP) level and Bath Ankylosing Spondylitis Disease Activity Index (BASDAI) score and negatively correlated with disease duration. 
Conclusion: Anti-Kaiso autoantibody may become a valuable diagnostic biomarker for early stage of AS in the nr-axSpA period and even a potential therapeutic target.