A 26-year-old woman, with a six-year history of well-controlled systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), complained of urinary frequency and urgency. After failure of commonly-used antibiotic therapy, mycobacterium tuberculosis was cultured from her urine and renal tuberculosis (TB) was diagnosed. However, she underwent right nephrectomy after the combination therapies of prednisone for SLE and anti-tuberculosis treatment for renal TB failed. To our knowledge, SLE accompanying renal TB is rare, and such a rapid deterioration in renal function has never been reported.
Keywords: Systemic lupus erythematosus; non-functioning kidney; renal tuberculosis.