You have probably noticed the flurry of articles published this week in the NEJM, coinciding with the International Liver Congress meeting in London, reporting incredible results with new direct-acting antiviral agents in Hepatitis C. This is undoubtedly one…
Mixed cryoglobulinemia (MC) is a systemic vasculitis in which B cell clones produce IgM with rheumatoid factor activity. The disease can range in severity from isolated skin lesions to full blown renal and neurological involvement. Most patients are…
Cryoglobulinemia is characterized by the presence of circulating antibodies which precipitate at cooler temperatures, and not infrequently leads to renal failure/glomerulonephritis. The stereotypical histologic lesion of cryoglobulinemia is membranoproliferative glomerulonephritis, which takes the appearance on light microscopy of…
Sjogren’s syndrome is an autoimmune disorder in which there is immune-mediated damage to the exocrine glands which produce tears and saliva. Many patients (up to 25%) will have extraglandular manifestations of the disease, one of the possibilities of…
The treatment of hepatitis C-induced cryoglobulinemia can be broken down into two different arms, both of which are usually necessary: 1. Antiviral Therapy, to get at the root-cause of the problem. 2. Immunosuppression Therapy, to prevent the acute…
Prior to the discovery of the hepatitis C virus (viral particles shown on the left), there was an entity termed “essential cryoglobulinemia”–that is, cryoglobulinemia without an obvious explanation. While this term is still used, the true “essential cryoglobulinemia”…
Whenever you recommend that “cryoglobulins” be drawn on a patient, it is important to realize that the specimen must be collected in a very specific way. It cannot be simply “added on” to a specimen already drawn. Cryoglobulins…
