Multimodal therapy in life-threatening cerebral lupus erythematosus: the benefit of cerebrospinal fluid pheresis.

A 27-year-old female patient with severe cerebral systemic lupus erythematosus did not respond to conventional therapy, including high-dose corticosteroids and high-dose pulsed cyclophosphamide therapy. Cerebrospinal fluid filtration (pheresis) led to rapid and lasting neurological improvement and clinical cure.