Immuno-histological changes in lupus nephritis in female patients: a four-year study.

The objective of this study was to classify renal biopsies of all female patients diagnosed to have systemic lupus erythematosus at the College of Medicine, King Abdul Aziz University Hospital, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia over a period of four years between 19th January 2002 and 30th April 2006. Lupus nephritis was classified according to the modified WHO classification. The immunofluorescence pattern was also studied. All the study patients were examined, investigated, treated and followed-up in our center. We observed that class IV lupus nephritis was the most commonly seen lesion and IgG showed strong positivity in most of the cases. We believe that a more elaborate study is needed to explain the relatively high female to male ratio noticed in our study.