Browsing by Subject "Rheumatoid arthritis (RA)"

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    Biomarkers for autoimmunie disease diagnosis in the public health sector: A systematic review and meta-analysis
    (2025) Morar, Zeena; Engel, Mark; Salie, Taariq; Bana, Tasnim
    Rheumatic heart disease (RHD), rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) are autoimmune diseases with drastic effects on quality of life. Diagnostic challenges remain, especially given the prevalence of these diseases among people of low socioeconomic status. The purpose of this review was to determine, from published case-control and cross-sectional studies, whether selected protein biomarkers are discriminatory indicators of RHD, RA and SLE. This review was carried out in accordance with the Preferential Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analysis (PRISMA). A significant increase in adiponectin was found in patients with SLE and in patients with RA (including those with severe and mild cases of RA) as compared with healthy controls. Ficolin-3 was significantly upregulated in SLE patients and downregulated in RHD patients, while alpha-2-glycoprotein 1 was significantly upregulated in SLE patients compared to controls. Gelsolin was significantly downregulated in patients with RHD and in SLE patients with a flare-up and in remission. Given that data remain scant, further research into these proteins, along with others not previously identified, is warranted to evaluate their discriminatory power for the development of a cost-effective point-of-care diagnostic test.
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    Impaired energetics and normal myocardial lipids in rheumatoid arthritis and systemic lupus erythematosus: a phosphorous and proton magnetic resonance spectroscopy and cardiovascular magnetic resonance study
    (BioMed Central Ltd, 2015) Ntusi, Ntobeko; Holloway, Cameron; Francis, Jane; Davis, Anne; Levelt, Eylem; Piechnik, Stefan; Ferreira, Vanessa; Matthews, Paul; Wordsworth, Paul; Karamitsos, Theodoros; Neubauer, Stefan
    Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) commonly involve the cardiovascular system and are associated with significant morbidity and mortality, driven by cardiovascular inflammation, microvascular and diastolic dysfunction and fibrosis. Cardiovascular magnetic resonance (CMR) can assess non-invasively cardiac function, strain, ischaemia, altered vascular function, perfusion, inflammation and fibrosis; magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS) provides further insights into the status of myocardial energetics and lipidosis. To date, there have been no cardiovascular MRS studies in RA and SLE patients. We hypothesised that RA and SLE would be associated with impaired myocardial energetics and lipidosis.
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    Impaired myocardial perfusion in rheumatoid arthritis is associated with impaired strain, strain rate, disease activity and myocardial oedema: a cardiovascular magnetic resonance study
    (BioMed Central Ltd, 2015) Ntusi, Ntobeko; Sever, Emily; Lockey, Joseph; Francis, Jane; Piechnik, Stefan; Ferreira, Vanessa; Matthews, Paul; Wordsworth, Paul; Neubauer, Stefan; Karamitsos, Theodoros
    Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) commonly involves the cardiovascular system, and is associated with significant morbidity and mortality. Mechanisms of cardiovascular disease (CVD) involvement are not fully understood, but cardiovascular inflammation is thought to drive many of the CVD manifestations, including myocardial ischaemia. The clinical utility of CMR first-pass perfusion for assessment of myocardial ischaemia is well-established. The aim of this study was to assess whether RA patients without known epicardial coronary artery disease have evidence of myocardial hypoperfusion.