Calciphylaxis may be considered a small vessel vasculopathy which is generaly associated with end-stage renal disease and hyperparathyroidism. The precise pathogenesis of the disease is not known. It needs sensitizers and challengers to occur. Steroids and immunosuppressive drugs including methotrexate are among those challenger agents. Calciphylaxis in collagen vascular diseases is rare. Only ...

Neutrophil chemiluminescence was determined in patients with active rheumatoid arthritis. Twelve patients were randomly assigned either to a diet high in polyunsaturated fatty acids supplemented with eicosapentaenoic and docosahexaenoic acids or to a diet high in saturated fatty acids. A correlation with clinical and laboratory parameters is also reported. No statistical difference was observed...

high levels of rheumatoid factors (rf) are detectable in serum of the majority of patients with rheumatoid arthritis (ra), but 5-10% of patients remain seronegative (sn). despite clinical and genetic similarities between these two subsets of ra, it has been proposed that they may be regarded as distinct clinical entities. methods: in the present study a panel of monoclonal antibodies (mab) reco...

This case report describes the re-administration of abatacept to successfully reduce the articularsymptoms of a patient with rheumatoid arthritisduring the intensive phase of anti-tuberculous therapy. A 75-year-old man developed active pulmonary tuberculosis during the administration of abatacept for rheumatoid arthritis. The patient experienced a paradoxical reaction and exacerbation of rheuma...

total igm, iga, and igm-rheumatoid factor (rf) and iga-rf were quantitated in the serum and synovial fluid of 35 seropositive and 8 seronegative rheumatoid arthritis (ra) patients, using a sensitive enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (elisa). mononuclear cells isolated from peripheral blood and synovial fluid of three seropositive patients were also stimulated in vitro with phorbol myristate ace...

Rheumatoid arthritis is a chronic multi-system disease of unknown cause. It affects the people in their prime of life, predominantly between the ages of 20-50 years with unpredictable course. Sudard is used in the ayurvedic system of medicine for the treatment of inflammation and pain associated with rheumatoid arthritis, osteo-arthritis, frozen shoulder, sciatica, ankylosing spondylitis and ...

Sixteen lymph nodes from 14 patients with rheumatoid arthritis were examined immunohistochemically and morphometrically and compared with 10 control nodes showing follicular hyperplasia from patients without rheumatoid disease. Frozen material was available from nine patients and all controls. The nodes from patients with rheumatoid arthritis seemed to share characteristic features. The most st...

BACKGROUND Effective new therapies are needed for rheumatoid arthritis. Current therapies target the products of activated macrophages; however, T cells also have an important role in rheumatoid arthritis. A fusion protein--cytotoxic T-lymphocyte-associated antigen 4-IgG1 (CTLA4Ig)--is the first in a new class of drugs known as costimulation blockers being evaluated for the treatment of rheumat...