Anti-ribosomal P antibodies related to depression in early clinical course of systemic lupus erythematosus

Background: diagnosis and treatment of neuropsychiatric lupus is still a major challenge in clinical practice. we investigated the association between depression and anti-ribosomal p (anti-p) antibodies in a sample of iranian patients with systemic lupus erythematosus (sle). materials and methods: this cross-sectional study was conducted on adult patients with sle referring to a referral out-patient clinic of rheumatology. demographic data and clinical data with regards to measuring disease activity with the systemic lupus erythematosus disease activity index were gathered. anti-p antibodies were measured with the enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay method. depression severity was measured by the beck depression inventory-ii. results: one hundred patients (80% female and 20% male, age = 34.8 ± 10.9 years) were included. anti-p antibodies were present more frequently in depressed than non-depressed patients (30% vs. 10%, p = 0.015). depression severity was correlated with anti-p antibodies level only in patients with disease duration of less than 2 years (r = 0.517, p = 0.019). there was no association between the depression severity and disease activity. binary logistic regression analysis showed age (b = 0.953, ci 95%: 0.914-0.993) and positive anti-p antibodies (b = 4.30, ci 95%: 1.18-15.59) as factors that independently associated with depression. conclusion: we found an association between depression and presence of anti-p antibodies, and also strong correlation between depression severity and anti-p antibodies level in newly diagnosed sle patients. depression severity in newly diagnosed sle patients may reflect a neuropsychiatric involvement, and in later phases, it is more affected by the chronicity of the disease as well as other environmental factors.