A heterogeneous group of autoimmune diseases with systemic involvement is represented as Idiopathic inflammatory myopathies. Although numerous specific autoantibodies have been recognized, they have not been included, with the only exception of anti-Jo-1, into the 2017 Classification Criteria. This resulted in perpetuating a clinical-serologic gap.
Deep impacts on the diagnostic approach, therapeutic choices, and prognostic stratification are observed due to the lack of homogeneous grouping based on the antibody profile of these patients. This review was done in order to highlight the comprehensive scenario regarding myositis-related autoantibodies, from the molecular characterization and biological significance to target antigens, from the detection tools, with a special focus on immunofluorescence patterns on HEp-2 cells, to their relative prevalence and ethnic diversity, from the clinical presentation to prognosis.
The surprising and unfortunate condition on the under study subject matter was that even if a notable body of literature is present the quality of the findings is not up to the mark. The quality of data is low because it is fragmented, retrospectively based, and collected from small case series, so that they do not sufficiently support the decision-making process into the clinics.
Reference: https://clinicalmolecularallergy.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12948-018-0084-9
