gms | German Medical Science

45. Kongress der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Rheumatologie, 31. Jahrestagung der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Orthopädische Rheumatologie, 27. Jahrestagung der Gesellschaft für Kinder- und Jugendrheumatologie

06.09. - 09.09.2017, Stuttgart

Proteasome inhibition with bortezomib in SLE promotes therapeutically relevant depletion of short- and long-lived plasma cells but does not prevent their regeneration

Meeting Abstract

  • Tobias Alexander - Charité - Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Medizinische Klinik mit Schwerpunkt Rheumatologie und klinische Immunologie, Berlin
  • Bimba Franziska Hoyer - Medizinische Klinik mit Schwerpunkt Rheumatologie und klin. Immunologie, Charité Universitätsmedizin Berlin - Deutsches Rheumaforschungszentrum Berlin, Berlin
  • Jens Klotsche - Deutsches Rheuma-Forschungszentrum (DRFZ), Programmbereich Epidemiologie, Berlin
  • Qingyu Cheng - Deutsches Rheuma-Forschungszentrum (DRFZ), Charité - Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Medizinische Klinik mit Schwerpunkt Rheumatologie und klinische Immunologie, Berlin
  • Adriano Taddeo - Deutsches Rheuma-Forschungszentrum (DRFZ), Charité - Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Medizinische Klinik mit Schwerpunkt Rheumatologie und klinische Immunologie, Berlin
  • Anja A. Kühl - Charité - Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Gastroenterology, Infectiology and Rheumatology and Research Center ImmunoScience (RCIS), Berlin
  • Gerd-Rüdiger Burmester - Charité - Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Medizinische Klinik mit Schwerpunkt Rheumatologie und klinische Immunologie, Berlin
  • Andreas Radbruch - Deutsches Rheuma-Forschungszentrum (DRFZ), Berlin
  • Falk Hiepe - Charité - Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Medizinische Klinik mit Schwerpunkt Rheumatologie und klinische Immunologie, Berlin

Deutsche Gesellschaft für Rheumatologie. Deutsche Gesellschaft für Orthopädische Rheumatologie. Gesellschaft für Kinder- und Jugendrheumatologie. 45. Kongress der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Rheumatologie (DGRh), 31. Jahrestagung der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Orthopädische Rheumatologie (DGORh), 27. Jahrestagung der Gesellschaft für Kinder- und Jugendrheumatologie (GKJR). Stuttgart, 06.-09.09.2017. Düsseldorf: German Medical Science GMS Publishing House; 2017. DocER.24

doi: 10.3205/17dgrh101, urn:nbn:de:0183-17dgrh1016

Veröffentlicht: 4. September 2017

© 2017 Alexander et al.
Dieser Artikel ist ein Open-Access-Artikel und steht unter den Lizenzbedingungen der Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License (Namensnennung). Lizenz-Angaben siehe http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.


Gliederung

Text

Background: We previously identified long-lived plasma cells (PCs) are an essential component of the pathogenic immunologic memory, which is resistant to immunosuppressive and B cell depleting therapies and contributes to the chronicity of SLE. We recently demonstrated that their targeting with the proteasome inhibitor bortezomib resulted in therapeutically relevant plasma cell depletion in refractory cases of SLE. Here we investigated in detail the cellular and serologic responses of bortezomib treatment.

Methods: Eight patients received a median of two 21-day cycles of intravenous bortezomib 1.3mg/m2 as induction therapy for active SLE. Disease activity was assessed using the SLEDAI-2K score. Serum concentrations of anti-double-stranded DNA (anti-dsDNA), vaccine-induced antibodies and BAFF levels were monitored. Flow cytometry was performed to analyze peripheral blood B cells, T cells and PCs and Siglec-1 expression on monocytes as surrogate marker for type-I interferon (IFN).

Results: Upon proteasome inhibition, serum levels for anti-double-stranded (ds)DNA (~60%) and vaccine-induced antibodies for Measels, Mumps, TT (~30%) significantly declined, complement levels and serum BAFF levels significantly increased and SLEDAI significantly decreased (p=0.014). The level of bone marrow PCs decreased by 50%, affecting both CD19+ and CD19- CD138/CD38 expressing PCs. While number and phenotype of peripheral blood T- and B cells remained unaffected, proteasome inhibition was associated with a significant depletion of HLA-DR+ (p=0.024), HLA-DR- (p=0.038) and IgA+ (p=0.032) PCs, but their regeneration was fast. Within ten days from the last bortezomib injection, their numbers significantly increased (beta=2.1; 95%CI: 0.5, 3.7; p=0.012), an effect that was more pronounced in HLA-DR+ short-lived than in HLA-DR- long-lived PCs. Overall, the magnitude of increase over time did not significantly decrease. Siglec-1 expression on monocytes significantly declined.

Conclusion: These findings identify proteasome inhibitors as a promising novel treatment option for patients with refractory SLE by targeting short- and long-lived PCs and type I IFN activity. Bortezomib efficiently induces short-term remissions but would require additional B cell directed treatment approaches to inhibit PC regeneration from their precursors for sustained efficacy.