Primary Sjögren's syndrome (pSS) is an important cause of xerostomia, and the presence of this symptom in lupus erythematosus (LE) is usually referred to as secondary SS. Although these diseases share many clinical and laboratory aspects, the histopathological changes of minor salivary glands (MSG) have been widely evaluated to determine whether this damage is specific for each disease. Based on this query, the aim of this study was to analyze morphological findings of minor salivary glands in pSS or LE.
Two groups of 30 (MSG) from patients with pSS and LE were histopathologically evaluated, and the results were statistically analyzed using the two-tailed Fisher exact test.
The morphological changes were distinct among the groups and statistically significant. In pSS, the most evident features were the focal lymphocytic ductal aggression, with the focus score ≥1 and the periductal fibroplasia, while in LE, perivascular inflammatory infiltrate, spongiosis of ductal cells not associated with the exocytosis, and hyalinization of the periductal basement membrane were detected.
These results indicated that in each disorder, MSG have their specific morphological changes, which lead to xerostomia, and the impairment of MSG in LE is probably due to a lupus sialadenitis.