IVIg treatment reduces catalytic antibody titers of renal transplanted patients

PLoS One. 2013 Aug 15;8(8):e70731. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0070731. eCollection 2013.

Abstract

Catalytic antibodies are immunoglobulins endowed with enzymatic activity. Catalytic IgG has been reported in several human autoimmune and inflammatory diseases. In particular, low levels of catalytic IgG have been proposed as a prognostic marker for chronic allograft rejection in patients undergoing kidney transplant. Kidney allograft is a treatment of choice for patients with end-stage renal failure. Intravenous immunoglobulins, a therapeutic pool of human IgG, is used in patients with donor-specific antibodies, alone or in conjunction with other immunosuppressive treatments, to desensitize the patients and prevent the development of acute graft rejection. Here, we followed for a period of 24 months the levels of catalytic IgG towards the synthetic peptide Pro-Phe-Arg-methylcoumarinimide in a large cohort of patients undergoing kidney transplantation. Twenty-four percent of the patients received IVIg at the time of transplantation. Our results demonstrate a marked reduction in levels of catalytic antibodies in all patients three months following kidney transplant. The decrease was significantly pronounced in patients receiving adjunct IVIg therapy. The results suggests that prevention of acute graft rejection using intravenous immunoglobulins induces a transient reduction in the levels of catalytic IgG, thus potentially jeopardizing the use of levels of catalytic antibodies as a prognosis marker for chronic allograft nephropathy.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Adult
  • Aged
  • Aged, 80 and over
  • Antibodies, Catalytic / blood
  • Antibodies, Catalytic / metabolism*
  • Autoantibodies / blood
  • Autoantibodies / immunology
  • Female
  • Graft Rejection / immunology
  • Histocompatibility Antigens / immunology
  • Humans
  • Hydrolysis
  • Immunoglobulin G / blood
  • Immunoglobulin G / metabolism
  • Immunoglobulins, Intravenous* / administration & dosage
  • Kidney Transplantation*
  • Male
  • Middle Aged
  • Prognosis
  • Young Adult

Substances

  • Antibodies, Catalytic
  • Autoantibodies
  • Histocompatibility Antigens
  • Immunoglobulin G
  • Immunoglobulins, Intravenous

Grants and funding

This work was supported by Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, by Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale, by Université Pierre et Marie Curie, and by grants from the Indo-French Center for Promotion of Advanced Research (Reference No: 4103-2), from Agence Nationale de la Recherche (ANR-09-GENO-028), from the Japan Sciences and Technology Agency (Tokyo, Japan) and from the Agence de la Biomédecine. OT and CL are members of the CENTAURE Transplantation Research Network. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.