Why the study?
Does acute or chronic infection cause positive ANA test results in patients with non-specific clinical symptoms?
Does acute or chronic infection cause positive ANA test results in patients with non-specific clinical symptoms?
A positive ANA test may be caused by acute or chronic infections rather than autoimmune diseases, highlighting the need for careful interpretation in patients with non-specific symptoms.
Autoantibody testing is performed to help diagnose patients who have clinical symptoms suggestive of possible autoimmune diseases. Antinuclear antibodies (ANA) are present in many systemic autoimmune conditions such as systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE). However, a positive ANA test may also be seen with non-autoimmune inflammatory diseases, including both acute and chronic infections. When the ANA test is used as an initial screen in patients with non-specific clinical symptoms, such as fever, joint pain, myalgias, fatigue, rash, or anemia, the likelihood of a positive result due to infection will increase, especially in children. This article identifies acute and chronic infectious diseases that are likely to produce a positive ANA result and summarizes recent literature addressing both the causes and consequences of these findings.
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Litwin et al. (2016) studied this question.
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