Membranous Nephropathy Associated With Autoimmune Thyroiditis

The association of autoimmune thyroiditis and glomerular diseases is not very frequent but the most commun association is with membranous nephropathy.In this paper we report two patients with membranous nephropathy and nephrotic syndrome in whom we could demonstrate positive titres of antithyroid antibodies.One of the cases had been diagnosed as membranous nephropathy some months before the clinical development of hypothyroidism and in the other patient the thyroiditis was diagnosed after ten years of the evolution of membranous nephropathy. This suggests that membranous nephropathy and autoimmune thyroiditis may not be a casual association and could reflect screening for antithyroid antibodies in patients with membranous nephropathy. The frequency of this association may be underestimated.