Clinical characteristics and associated factors of pediatric acute disseminated encephalomyelitis patients with MOG antibodies: a retrospective study in Hangzhou, China

Background To explore the clinical characteristics and related factors of children with acute disseminated encephalomyelitis (ADEM) with positive anti-myelin oligodendrocyte glycoprotein (MOG) antibody. Methods A retrospective study was conducted and enrolled pediatric ADEM patients who underwent serum MOG antibody detection from May 2017 to August 2020. The patients were divided into two groups: MOG- immunoglobulin G (IgG) positive ( n = 35) and MOG-IgG negative ( n = 50). We analyzed the clinical characteristics of MOG-IgG-positive ADEM pediatric patients and conducted a comparative analysis between the two groups. Results Thirty-five patients (21 males and 14 females) in the MOG-IgG-positive group with encephalopathy, multifocal neurological symptoms, and typical magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) abnormalities were enrolled. They usually had a favorable outcome, while some suffered from relapse. Compared to the MOG-IgG-negative group, MOG-IgG-positive ADEM patients had a longer disease duration (median: 10 vs. 6 days), more meningeal involvement (31.4% vs. 8%) and frontal lobe involvement (82.8% vs. 68%), higher relapse rates (14.3% vs. 2%), lower serum tumor necrosis factor (1–12.4 pg/ml, median 1.7 vs. 1–34 pg/ml, median 2.2) and interferon-gamma (1–9.4 pg/ml, median 1.3 vs. 1–64 pg/ml, median 3) ( P < 0.05, respectively). Multivariate logistic regression analysis showed that the longer disease duration, meningeal involvement and frontal lobe involvement were the correlated factors of patients with ADEM with MOG antibody ( P < 0.05). Conclusions Our findings provide clinical evidence that MOG-IgG positivity is associated with longer disease duration, meningeal involvement, and frontal lobe involvement.