Ali İNAL, Sedat KAYGUSUZ, Göksal KESKİN, Ergin AYAŞLIOĞLU, Dilek KILIÇ, Emel ERKEK

Analysis of Borrelia burgdorferi antibody seroprevalence in patients with Behçet's disease using 3 different serological assays

Abstract: Behçet's disease is a chronic multisystemic inflammatory vasculitis of unknown etiology. Various infectious agents have been implicated as potential triggering factors in the pathogenesis of the disease. The present study was designed to evaluate the seroprevalence of Borrelia burgdorferi antibodies in Turkish patients with Behçet's disease. For this purpose, 90 consecutive patients with Behçet's disease and 50 healthy individuals were enrolled into a prospective study. The IgM and IgG antibodies to B. burgdorferi in sera were determined by 3 different serological techniques, namely indirect immunofluorescence assay (IFA), enzyme linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) and Western blotting (WB). Although there was a tendency in the patient group toward a higher seropositivity rate using the ELISA and WB tests, statistical analysis revealed no difference in antibody prevalence between the patient and control groups for each technique performed (P >0.05 for all 3 assays). The findings of the present study do not support a potential role for B. burgdorferi in the etiopathogenesis of Behçet's disease, at least in the geographical region of central Anatolia.

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