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Abstract #3999

Quantitative susceptibility mapping in the basal ganglia of systemic lupus erythematosus patients with neuropsychiatric complaints

Marjolein Bulk1, Thijs van Harten1, Boyd Kenkhuis1, Francesca Inglese1, Ingrid Hegeman1, Sjoerd van Duinen1, Ece Ercan1, Cesar Magro-Checa1,2, Jelle Goeman1, Christian Mawrin3, Mark van Buchem1, Gerda Steup-Beekman1, Tom Huizinga1, Louise van der Weerd1, and Itamar Ronen1
1Leiden University Medical Center, Leiden, Netherlands, 2Zuyderland Medical Center, Heerlen, Netherlands, 3Otto-von-Guericke University, Magdeburg, Germany

We explored the link between iron accumulation and neuroinflammation in basal ganglia in SLE using quantitative susceptibility mapping. We hypothesized that SLE patients, and in particular NPSLE patients would have increased numbers of activated microglia co-localizing with iron, which in turn would be reflected in increased local susceptibility. Based on QSM results in patients, as well as on iron staining of post-mortem SLE brain tissue, our results suggest that neuroinflammation in NPSLE is not necessarily associated with iron accumulation, and that the inflammatory pathomechanism in SLE may differ from the one observed in neurodegenerative diseases and in multiple sclerosis.

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