Clinical study of treatment on diffuse proliferate lupus nephritis

Objective To study leflunomide plus prednisone in treating patients with diffuse proliferate lupus nephritis and discuss the curative effect and security. Methods Forty patients with diffuse proliferate lupus nephritis who were pathology confirmed,according to the principle of opening and random , were divided into treatment group(20 cases) and the control group(20 cases).Treatment group were given leflunomide combined with prednisone,control group applyed cyclophosphamide and prednisone. Obversing the curative effect, monitoring the 24-hour urine protein quantitation,serum albumin, serum creatinine,and blood complement component C3 changes of the two groups and recording adverse reactions pretherapy and post-treatment for one month, three months and six months. Results Compared treatment group with control group of prior-treatment, the differences were not statistically significant. Compared treatment group with control group of post-treatment, the differences still were not statistically significant(P>0.05).The indexes compared prior-treatment with post-treatment of two groups, both showed that urine protein significantly decreased, serum albumin significantly increased, complement component C3 significantly increased and serum creatinine remained unchanged. The incidence of adverse reactions was significantly less in the treatment group compared with control group, the difference was statistically significant(P<0.05).Conclusions The effect of leflunomide plus prednisone in treating lupus nephritis was reliable and adverse reactions were less. Key words: Leflunomide; Lupus nephritis; Curative effect; Adverse reactions