Lupus nephritis with preserved kidney function associated with poorer cardiovascular risk control: A call for more awareness.

BACKGROUND: Despite the improvement in the prognosis of lupus nephritis (LN), the cardiovascular morbimortality remains high. The early recognition and remission of flares, while trying to avoid the metabolic adverse effects of medication, must be mandatory.

AIM: The aim of our study was to assess the cardiovascular (CV) risk profile in a cohort of lupus patients with preserved kidney function after a nephritis episode, compared to patients without a nephritis flare.

METHODS: 130 patients diagnosed of SLE (32 with previous nephritis flare and 98 without) were studied in order to evaluate the CV risk profile, despite the preserved kidney function.

RESULTS: The most prevalent risk factors were sedentary lifestyle (57.6%), overweight/obesity (38.3%) and dyslipidemia (36%), followed by smoking (32%) and hypertension (16%). Though more than a half (53.1%) was taking CV medication, a high percentage did not reach a therapeutic target value, especially regarding obesity (11.5%) and cholesterol levels (LDL-C of 16%). The prevalence of dyslipidemia (53.1% vs 30.6%), smoking (46.6% vs 27.5%), left ventricular hypertrophy (LVH) (21.4% vs 6.4%) and lower HDL-C (48.6mg/dL vs 55.4mg/dL) were significantly different in the group with previous nephritis flare. Moreover, young patients with lupus nephritis, received more pulses of corticosteroids and cyclophosphamide, had higher prevalence of hypertension, LVH, higher proteinuria, hospital admissions and waist circumference, constituting the subgroup of patients with greater aggregation of CV risk factors.

CONCLUSIONS: Patients with previous nephritis flare showed a poor control of CV risk factors despite the preserved renal function, these patients would require a closer therapeutic management.