TY - JOUR T1 - Drs. Aggarwal and Oddis reply JF - The Journal of Rheumatology JO - J Rheumatol SP - 1565 LP - 1565 DO - 10.3899/jrheum.170480 VL - 44 IS - 10 AU - ROHIT AGGARWAL AU - CHESTER V. ODDIS Y1 - 2017/10/01 UR - http://www.jrheum.org/content/44/10/1565.abstract N2 - To the Editor:We appreciate the thoughtful comments provided by Drs. Chen and Liu1, and Drs. Jearn and Kim2 in their respective letters in response to our manuscript3. They indeed provide helpful information and perspective in the interpretation of antinuclear antibody (ANA) testing and the reporting of cytoplasmic staining in laboratories outside of the United States. In principle, we all agree that it is helpful to recognize cytoplasmic staining patterns seen on HEp-2 ANA testing. Chen and Liu raise an important question about the definition of anticytoplasmic autoantibody (anti-CytAb) used in our study1. Our study simply focused on the potential recognition of antisynthetase antibody (anti-SynAb)–positive patients using the results of the screening ANA on HEp-2 cells. Our definition of positive anti-CytAb is cytoplasmic staining … Address correspondence to Dr. R. Aggarwal, UPMC Arthritis and Autoimmunity Center, Division of Rheumatology and Clinical Immunology, Department of Medicine, 3601 Fifth Ave., Suite 2B, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15213, USA. E-mail: aggarwalr{at}upmc.edu, docrota{at}gmail.com ER -