Analysis of Sodium Chloride Intake and Treg/Th17 Lymphocytes in Healthy Individuals and Patients with Rheumatoid Arthritis or Systemic Lupus Erythematosus

Figure 3

Correlation analysis between salt intake and clinical and laboratory parameters in patients with SLE and RA. Patients with RA showed a significant negative correlation between salt intake and % of CD69⁺ Treg cells (CD4⁺CD25^varCD69⁺LAP⁺IL-10⁺Foxp3⁻) (a), whereas in patients with SLE, a significant negative association of salt intake and the levels of CD4⁺NKG2D⁺ (b) or NKG2D⁺ Treg cells (CD4⁺NKG2D⁺CD69⁺LAP⁺IL-10⁺Foxp3⁻) (c) was observed. Although in SLE patients salt intake tended to be associated with the % of Foxp3⁺ Treg cells, the value of r was nonsignificant (d). Both patients with SLE (e) and RA (f) showed similar levels of disease activity in those cases with low- and high-salt intake. ns: nonsignificant. (e, f) Data correspond to the arithmetic mean and SD.

(a) RA

(b) SLE

(c) SLE

(d) SLE

(e) SLE

(f) RA