Autoantigenic histone epitopes: a comparison between procainamide- and hydralazine-induced lupus.

Using the technique of immunoblotting, we assessed the ability of sera from 19 patients with drug-induced lupus to bind individual histones and specific histone fragments. The pattern of histone epitopes bound by sera from 9 patients with procainamide-induced lupus was very similar to that described previously in spontaneous systemic lupus erythematosus. In contrast, sera from 10 patients with hydralazine-induced lupus bound a broader array of individual histones and recognized a different set of histone epitopes. We conclude that these 2 drugs induce antihistone antibodies through somewhat different mechanisms, which possibly involve differences in their ability to structurally alter chromatin.