Clinical and immunoblotting analysis of thyroid autoantibodies in Graves' disease

Objective To study the clinical feature and the heterogeneity of thyroid autoantibodies in Graves disease.Methods Serum TG,rT3,FT3,FT4,s TSH,TGAb,TPOAb and TRAb were determined by radioimmunoassay in 77 patients with Graves disease in hyperthyroidism,76 patients in remission and 39 normal controls.The relation between thyroid antibodies and clinical indexes was analyzed.Using thyroid tissues of normal,Graves disease and Hashimotos thyroiditis as antigen,we detected the thyroid antibodies in Graves disease by Western blot.The sera of normal negative and standard positive (TGAb+,TPOAb+,TRAb+)were used as control.Results Only the titre and positive rate of TRAb in patients with Graves disease in hyperthyroidism were much higher than those in patients in remission.There was positive correlation between the titer of TRAb and titer of FT3 in Graves disease in hyperthyroidism( r= 0 424, P 0 05).The sera of patients with Graves disease can react with many thyroid antigens in Western blot.The number of bands appearing in electrophoretic lane of tissues of Graves disease and Hashimotos thyroiditis were much more than those in normal thyroid.Some bands didnt appear in electrophoretic lane of tissues of normal thyroid.Conclusions TRAb plays an important role in the pathogenesis of Graves disease.In addition to TGAb,TPOAb and TRAb,there were other thyroid antibodies in Graves disease and there was heterogeneity in thyroid autoantibodies.