DACTINOMYCIN TREATMENT OF MURINE LUPUS-ERYTHEMATOSUS .1. RENAL-DISEASE AND LONGEVITY

  • 1 January 1978
    • journal article
    • research article
    • Vol. 39  (5) , 441-448
Abstract
Three groups of female (NZB .times. NZW)F1 hybrid mice were treated with an imtermittent regimen of dactinomycin (actinomycin D), 3.5 .mu.g daily. Median survival was doubled in 2 of the groups and increased by more than 75% in the 3rd. Most of the treated animals never had significant proteinuria. When kidneys from 14 treated mice, which died between the ages of 11 and 20 mo., were examined by light and fluorescence microscopy, most showed the lesions of normal aged CBA and C57BL/6 mice, some expansions of the mesangial matrix and increased cellularity, consistent with deposition of immunoglobulins and complement components in the mesangium, generally sparing the capillary loops. Four of the 14 animals, 3 of them long-lived, had advanced renal glomerular disease. Dactinomycin, by whatever therapeutic mechanism, apparently permits very extended survival of B/W female mice, the large majority of them without significant renal disease.

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