Objective The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between antineutrophil cytoplasmic antibodies (ANCA) specificity and the risk of major adverse cardiovascular events (MACE) in patients with ANCA-associated vasculitis (AAV). Methods We conducted a retrospective study using the ANCA-associated vasculitis Toulouse cohort. The incidence of MACE, defined as myocardial infarction (MI) and/or stroke and/or all-cause death, was compared among patients according to their ANCA specificity. We also applied Cox regression models adjusted for traditional cardiovascular risk factors, age and sex to assess the risk of MI, stroke and MACE. Results A total of 402 patients were included, of whom 166 (41%) had antiproteinase 3 (anti-PR3) ANCA and 236 (59%) had antimyeloperoxidase (anti-MPO) ANCA. We identified 78 MACE during the follow-up period, including 15 MIs, 12 strokes and 62 deaths. The incidence rate of MACE in the ANCA+anti-PR3+ group was 21.4 per 1000 patient-years compared with 33.1 per 1000 patient-years in the ANCA+anti-MPO+ group (p=0.036). The time elapsed between the diagnosis of AAV and MACE occurrence was significantly shorter in the ANCA+anti-MPO+ group. The Cox regression model found that patients with anti-MPO ANCA tend to present more MACE, but the association was not statistically significant (HR 1.62; 95% CI 0.98 to 2.66; p=0.06). An association was found between the presence of anti-PR3 ANCA and a lower risk of strokes (HR 0.61; 95% CI 0.37 to 0.99; p=0.049) and none with the risk of MI. Conclusion Patients with anti-MPO ANCA appear to be at a higher risk of a composite MACE-all-cause mortality outcome than patients with anti-PR3 ANCA.
Lacasia et al. (Thu,) studied this question.