Clinicopathological features and HLA tissue typing in pemphigoid gestationis patients in Kuwait.

Abstract

Pemphigoid gestationis (PG) is a rare autoimmune disease of pregnancy. We report a series of 22 cases of PG in Kuwait. They constituted 18% of all the autoimmune bullous diseases registered in our centre over a span of 11 years. PG was observed to be the third most common bullous disease in our region. Ninety-five per cent of the patients were of Arab ethnicity. The clinical features observed in our patients were comparable to those reported elsewhere. Systemic steroids (prednisolone 20-60 mg daily) remained the mainstay of treatment to control the active disease and an optimal dose of 20 mg of prednisolone was maintained throughout the pregnancy and immediate postpartum period. We observed a favourable outcome of pregnancies complicated by PG without any associated maternal or foetal morbidity. Kuwaiti patients with PG were observed to have a predominance of HLA-DR3 and DQ2 antigens. No predominance of HLA-DR4 antigen was observed.