Circulating DNA in rheumatoid arthritis: pathological changes and association with clinically used serological markers

Background Early diagnosis of rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is crucial to providing effective therapy and often hampered by unspecific clinical manifestations. Elevated levels of extracellular circulating DNA (cirDNA) in patients with autoimmune disease were found to be associated with etiopathogenesis. To our knowledge, this is the first study to investigate the putative diagnostic use of cirDNA in RA and its association with disease activity. Methods Blood samples were taken from 63 healthy subjects (HS) and 74 patients with RA. cirDNA was extracted from plasma and cell surface-bound cirDNA frac... Mehr ...