Serum prolactin in patients with systemic lupus erythematosus and rheumatoid arthritis : correlation with disease activity, future therapeutic approach

Abstract EN

Prolactin has recently been recognized as an immunoregulatory hormone.

It is required for the induction of a number of cellular and humoral immune processes.

The role of prolactin in the immunopathogenesis of rheumatic diseases has not yet been established, however, reports that hyperprolactinemia plays a role in the pathogenesis of systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) are available.

The relation between prolactin level and rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is not yet defined.

We measured serum prolactin in 13 patients with active SLE and 21 patients with active RA, in a trial to detect the changes in serum prolactin levels in both diseases and to find the relation of prolactin levels to disease activity.

The results of this study revealed that hyperprolactinemia is a feature of both diseases as there was a statistically significant difference between prolactin levels in both diseases compared to normal controls.

A significant positive correlation was found between serum prolactin and ESR in all patients and between serum prolactin and activity score in RA patients.

We conclude that hyperprolactinemia has certainly a role in the immunopathogenesis of these diseases that may have future therapeutic implications especially in those patients with hyperprolactinemia.