Rheumatoid Arthritis & Autoimmune Glomerulonephritis -case report about the effect of long term use of TNF inhibitors on kidneys

Rheumatoid arthritis is rarely associated with renal manifestations, but secondary amyloidosis due to chronic inflammation is reported to be the etiology of renal dysfunction in many cases.

Autoimmune glomerulonephritis is rarely described in the literature, but when it is, it’s mostly in close temporal relation with the use of TNF-alpha inhibitors.5 It’s not known if the autoimmune process induced by the exposure continues after discontinuation of these drugs and is responsible for further damage in the following years.

Here, we present a case of long-standing, poorly controlled RA in a patient previously exposed to multiple TNF-alpha inhibitors who developed immune-mediated membrano-proliferative glomerulonephritis (MPGN).

http://www.the-rheumatologist.org/article/rheumatoid-arthritis-autoimmune-glomerulonephritis/?singlepage=1