Journal of Neurological Research And Therapy

Journal of Neurological Research And Therapy

Current Issue Volume No: 2 Issue No: 2

Case-report Article Open Access
  • Available online freely Peer Reviewed
  • Myasthenia And Antisynthetase Antibody Syndrome: A Case Report In Togo

    1 Clinique neurologique, CHU SylvanusOlympio, BP 57, Lome-Togo 

    2 Service de neurologie, CHU du Campus, BP 4231, Lome-Togo 

    Abstract

    Myasthenia is a rare neurological condition with risk of death in case of inappropriate

    management. The outcome of this pathology is very bad in developing countries with inadequate technical

    Platform. We underlined the main difficulties of diagnostic and the management of Myasthenie and antisynthetase antibody syndrome in a 44 years-old Togolese man.

    Author Contributions
    Received Aug 17, 2017     Accepted Sep 08, 2017     Published Sep 16, 2017

    Copyright© 2017 Kokou Mensah GUINHOUYA, et al.
    License
    Creative Commons License   This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

    Competing interests

    The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

    Funding Interests:

    Citation:

    Kokou Mensah GUINHOUYA, Lheleng AGBA, Nyinevi Komla ANAYO, Mofou BELO, Agnon Koffi BALOGOU et al. (2017) Myasthenia And Antisynthetase Antibody Syndrome: A Case Report In Togo Journal of Neurological Research And Therapy. - 2(2):23-25
    DOI 10.14302/issn.2470-5020.jnrt-17-1738

    Introduction

    Introduction

    Myasthenia gravis is an autoimmune disease of the neuromuscular junction 1. It is a rare condition, with an estimated prevalence between 45 and 142 per 1000 000 inhabitants, which can occur at any age, but with a clear predominance of females 2. Myasthenia gravis may in rare cases associate with other immune diseases such as Hashimoto's thyroiditis, lupus erythematosus, rheumatoid arthritis and juvenile diabetes 3. The association of myasthenia gravis with antisynthetase antibody syndrome is even more rare 4. We report here a case of this association between myasthenia gravis and anti-synthetase syndrome.

    Discussion

    Discussion

    Among rare neuromuscular junction conditions, autoimmune myasthenia gravis remains the most common cause. Its prevalence is between 45 and 142 per 1000 000 inhabitants, while its incidence varies from 2.5 to 20. case / million / year depending on the populations studied 2. SAS is part of a heterogeneous group of primary inflammatory myopathies. This syndrome is characterized by the association of inflammatory myopathy, interstitial lung disease, characteristic cutaneous abnormalities such as "mechanic's hands", Raynaud's syndrome, inflammatory arthritis, and Biological, anti autoantibodies specific anti-nuclear called "anti synthetases" which gave their name to the syndrome. The frequency of clinical signs is variable: 94% for inflammatory arthritis, 62% for the phenomenon of Raynaud, 71% for the sign of the mechanic's hand 5. There are currently eight different SASs. It is exceptional to be in the presence of two SAS simultaneously. Depending on the antibody present, the clinical expression of the disease is different 6. Our patient was positive for PL7 antibody. Hervier B et al noted by reporting 17 cases that anti-PL7 positive patients have in 60 to 100% of pulmonary manifestations. This is the case of our patient who had for several years as main symptom a dyspnea of ​​effort. In all cases according to some authors 6, it is necessary to think of looking for an anti-synthetase antibody in an interstitial pneumopathy. Prognosis depends to a great extent on pulmonary involvement. Patients positive for PL12 had skin, vascular (Raynaud's syndrome), pulmonary and esophageal 6. The aforementioned extra pulmonary signs are absent in our patient concordant with the negativity of anti PL12 in the latter. The physiopathology of SAS remains unknown to the present day. Only hypotheses have been suggested, indexing a genetic susceptibility and environmental factors (viral and bacterial infections) that can be an immunologically triggering factor. The mechanism of immune response and antibody production remains unclear 7. The diagnosis of myasthenia gravis was mentioned in our patient before the pharmacological test, the dosage of anti anti RACH. From a therapeutic point of view, anticholinestherases represent the first-line treatment of the symptomatic strand. The background treatment is done with corticosteroids and immunosuppressants. Plasma exchanges and immunoglobulin administration are reserved for severe relapses or myasthenia gravis 2. There are currently no randomized controlled trials in the treatment of SAS 6. However, treatment lines are proposed. In the first line, corticosteroids (CS) at 1 mg / kg / day over a period of 4 to 8 weeks followed by a progressive reduction. In the absence of a response after 12 weeks, immunosuppressive therapy should be combined. Azathioprine is the most widely used drug, as several studies have shown its efficacy in the range of 57-75% at 2 to 3 mg / kg / day. Second-line therapy is the administration of intravenous immunoglobulin (Ig IV), cyclosporine or plasma exchange. However, a randomized, placebo-controlled study showed no benefit to plasma exchange 7. The treatment of myasthenia gravis and SAS containing to some extent the same molecules, we put our patient under anticholinestherasics (Pyridostigmine), corticosteroid (Prednisolone) and immunosuppressant (Azathioprine).We are waiting for a specialist immunological advice that we lack in Togo.

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