New Analysis Defines Three Distinct Sjögren Syndrome Subgroups

A ‘First Step’ to Subgrouping Patients

Alan Baer, MD, director of the Jerome Greene Sjogren’s Syndrome Center at John Hopkins Medical Center in Baltimore, Maryland, who commented on the study, noted that these three subgroups did “resonate” with what clinicians see in practice. Certain patients may have lab results that are “quite striking” even though they report minimal symptoms. The reverse is also true: Patients who have a high symptom burden without signs of systemic disease activity. Whether these patients should be managed differently “remains the key question,” he said.

“The hope is that when you have a group of patients that’s relatively homogenous in terms of their clinical features, that also translates to similarities into the underlying pathogenesis that can then lead to treatments that are targeted to specific subgroups of patients,” he added.

Another approach could be looking directly at molecular alterations across patients with SS and seeing how they correlate to clinical features, Dr. Baer noted.

This study “is a first step” in figuring out how to best define SS subgroups, he said, adding that “there’s more work to be done.”

This research was funded by the Fondation pour la Recherche Medicale, French Ministry of Health, French Society of Rheumatology, Innovative Medicines Initiative 2 Joint Undertaking, Medical Research Council UK, and Foundation for Research in Rheumatology. The study authors disclosed financial relationships with various pharmaceutical companies. Dr. Baer had no relevant disclosures.

A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com .