Lupus Diathesis and the Hydralazine Syndrome

CERTAIN hypertensive patients treated with hydralazine hydrochloride acquire a clinical picture that, when fully manifested, is indistinguishable from that of systemic lupus erythematosus.1,2 The relation of this drug-induced disease to spontaneously occurring lupus erythematosus, as yet undetermined, is important because it may provide some clues to the pathogenesis and prevalence of systemic lupus erythematosus and related conditions.We believe that overt systemic lupus erythematosus as presently known is the end, stage of a long standing process, possibly genetically induced, that may remain latent until unmasked or exacerbated by one of various agents with this potential.3 4 5 This latency or the . . .