A 27-year old woman presented with fever, weight loss, arthralgia, macular skin rash and bilateral axillary lymphadenopathy. The histology of an excised lymph node showed evidence suggestive of Kikuchi disease. Subsequent laboratory tests showed evidence of Systemic Lupus Erythematosus, underscoring the importance of considering other diagnoses in a nodal histological diagnosis of Kikuchi disease, a benign condition of unknown aetiology.
A 26-year-old Indian lady was admitted for lower abdominal pain, diarrhoea, vomiting, fever and cough. The initial diagnosis was that of peritonitis secondary to ruptured or perforated viscus with lobar pneumonia. On laparotomy, she was found to have necrotizing or Kikuchi's lymphadenitis of the abdominal lymph nodes. The initial two antinuclear antibody (ANA) results came back negative. She was diagnosed to have systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) when the third sample for ANA came back positive and the double-stranded DNA (dsDNA) antibody test was homogenously positive. This case illustrates a need to be aware that necrotizing lymphadenitis can precede the onset of systemic lupus erythematosus.