Four female Mexican-American infants, two siblings, had widespread deposit of hyaline material in skin, gastrointestinal tract, adrenals, urinary bladder, ovaries, skeletal muscles, thymus, parathyroids, and other loci. Clinical features included thickness and focal nodularity of skin, relatively short limbs and neck, gum hypertrophy, hypotonia and reduced movement, joint contractures, osteoporosis, growth failure, diarrhea, and recurrent infections. Clinical onset was in the first week, and all 4 patients died by age 20 months. Infantile systemic hyalinosis appears to be a specific, presumably autosomal recessive, genetic disease, differing from the disorder called systemic hyalinosis, juvenile hyaline fibromatosis, or Puretic syndrome. The biochemical defect and the pathogenetic mechanisms responsible for the pathologic and clinical features of this condition remain to be established.

Renal lesions found in 21 autopsied patients with hemosiderosis, 18 with beta-thalassemia, two with Blackfan-Diamond anemia, and one with aplastic anemia included: cellular glomeruli with increased mesangial matrix; hemosiderin deposit in visceral and parietal glomerular epithelial cells; greater hemosiderin deposit in terminal straight portions of proximal convoluted tubules and distal convoluted tubules than in connecting segments, or collecting tubules, connective tissue ferrugination; lipofuscin in tubular epithelium and vascular smooth muscle; infrequently, intimal or medial arterial thickening, and, in one patient with thalassemia, an infarct resulting from arterial thrombus. The progression of these lesions over the course of disease, and possible effects on the various lesions of high transfusion regimen, oral pancreatin, vitamin E supplementation, or treatment with intramuscular, subcutaneous, or intravenous desferrioxamine were evaluated. The results of urine and renal function studies of 4 of the autopsied patients (3 thalassemia, 1 Blackfan-Diamond anemia), and 14 patients with thalassemia and 4 with Blackfan-Diamond anemia who were not autopsied, are presented. Rarely significant until preterminal stages, the renal functional changes reflect distal more than proximal tubule dysfunction.

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The pathological findings in the lungs and related organs of 26 patients (21 female, 5 male) with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), with onset of disease before age 20 years, were reviewed. Several categories of lung lesions were found. Chronic interstitial pneumonitis was present in all 26 patients and was severe in 5. Acute pneumonia was present in 20, mild in 13, moderate in 2, and severe in 5. Alveolar hemorrhage, massive enough to cause death in 5, was seen in 18 patients, and pulmonary edema was found in 13. Fourteen patients had hyaline membranes indicative of acute alveolar damage (DAD), 12 had alveolitis obliterans, indicative of prior episodes of DAD, and 9 had bronchiolitis obliterans. Other parenchymal lesions were mild interstitial fibrosis in 12, alveolar hemosiderosis and alveolar overinflation in 10 each, and alveolar septal calcinosis with chronic renal insufficiency in 3. Pleural effusion, pleuritis, or pleural thickening were noted in 15 of 26, 6 of 23, and 7 of 23 evaluable patients, respectively. Vascular lesions were present in 16 as intimal thickening (9), thromboemboli (8), medial hypertrophy (6), calcinosis (3), and vasculitis (2). A previously unreported lesion was chronic (proliferative) peribronchitis, noted in 11 patients. Diaphragmatic lesions included mild variation in fiber size in 7, mild fibrosis in 2, and calcinosis in 1 of 13 evaluable patients. Correlation of the above lesions with previously described lung syndromes in SLE such as lupus pneumonitis, hemorrhagic lung disease, chronic interstitial fibrosis, lupus cor pulmonale, pleurisy, and "shrinking lung syndrome" are discussed.