Dialysis-related amyloidosis: visceral involvement and protein constituents

beta 2-M amyloidosis mainly concerns dialysis patients and typically presents with osteoarticular symptoms. In order to precise the incidence and gravity of visceral involvement, subcutaneous abdominal fat aspirates, skin and rectal biopsies, as well as echocardiograms were performed in 26 patients with severe beta 2-M amyloidosis. Visceral amyloidosis was confirmed in 58% and the numbers were even higher when including heart abnormalities suggestive of amyloidosis (81%). Clinical manifestations of visceral involvement were usually not severe and include odynophagia, gastrointestinal haemorrhage, intestinal obstruction, kidney stones, myocardial dysfunction and subcutaneous tumours. The removal and synthesis rates of beta 2-M were assessed during dialysis. Serum 131I-beta 2-M levels decreased by 5-10% with cuprophane and by 40-45% with polysulfone and polyacrylonitrile membranes. These reduction rates were higher than those found with unlabelled beta 2-M suggesting an increased synthesis or release during dialysis. The protein constituents of amyloid deposits were studied. Two different preparative methods to extract the proteins from amyloid deposits were used. TCA precipitation showed the presence of several proteins which were not observed with PBS homogenizing and resuspending in guanidine. The protein constituents of amyloid fibrils were studied by both, two dimensional gel electrophoresis (2D-gel) as well as protein sequencing after gel filtration. Similarly, the technical approach used for protein analysis greatly influenced the results. It was observed that 2D-gel displayed the presence of proteins which were missed by the gel filtration technique. Some of the proteins contained in amyloid deposits in addition to beta 2-M, were identified as globin chains, kappa and lambda light chains of immunoglobulins, and alpha 2 macroglobulin. A putative participation of these other protein constituents on the pathogenesis of beta 2-microglobulin amyloidosis is discussed.