• The Journal of Korean Academy of Orthopedic Manual Physical Therapy
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.16-24
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• 2008

Anatomy: Advanced knowledges of cellular and molecular biology led to the development of therapies of rheumatoid arthritis(RA). Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is a chronic, recurrent, systemic inflammatory disease and results in major deformity or dysfunction of joints. Etiology: Rheumatoid arthritis is now concevied as autoimmune disease. There have been many trials to define the immunological changes in rheumatoid arthritis. But now pathogenesis and significance of immunoglobulin complement and rheumatoid factor are not full accepted. Syndrome: Joints are characteristically involved with early inflammatory changes in the synovial membrane, peripheral portions of the articular cartilage, and lation tissue(pannus) forms, covers, and erodes the articular cartilage, bone and ligaments within the jiont capsule. Inflammatory changes also occur in tendon sheaths(tenosynovitis), and if subjected to a lot of friction, the tendons may fray or rupture. Extra-articular pathological changes sometimes occur, these include rheumatoid nodules, atrophy and fibrosis of muscles, and mild cardiac changes. Treatment: Tumor necrosis factor(TNF) inhibitor for the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis(RA) induces not only significant improvement of symptoms and signs of RA but also substantial inhibition of progressive joint damage.

• Journal of the Korean Data and Information Science Society
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• v.22 no.3
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• pp.555-563
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• 2011

Osteoarthritis (OA) and rheumatoid arthritis (RA) are most popular types of arthritis in Korea. This study compared health-related quality of life (HRQoL) of homedwelling people with OA and RA in Korea. Data were drawn from the Korean nationwide representative survey. Subjects were 3,352 people with arthritis over 19 years of age (2,953 OA respondents and 399 RA respondents). Good HRQoL in OA respondents was dierentiated with limitation of mobility, perceived health status, age, economic status, presence of arthralgia, gender, medical coverage, and educational level. Good HRQoL in RA respondents was dierentiated with limitation of mobility, perceived health status, economic status, educational status, and presence of arthralgia. In conclusion, HRQoL and predictors of good HRQoL among people with arthritis diers for OA or RA. These results can be of use in development of health programs and clinical interventions for community-dwelling people with arthritis.

• Journal of Yeungnam Medical Science
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• v.40 no.1
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• pp.23-29
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• 2023

The pathological hallmark of rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is a synovial pannus that comprises proliferating and invasive fibroblast-like synoviocytes, infiltrating inflammatory cells, and an associated neoangiogenic response. Animal models have been established to study these pathological features of human RA. Spontaneous and induced animal models of RA primarily reflect inflammatory aspects of the disease. Among various induced animal models, collagen-induced arthritis (CIA) and collagen antibody-induced arthritis (CAIA) models are widely used to study the pathogenesis of RA. Improved transplantation techniques for severe combined immunodeficiency (SCID) mouse models of RA can be used to evaluate the effectiveness of potential therapeutics in human tissues and cells. This review provides basic information on various animal models of RA, including CIA and CAIA. In addition, we describe a SCID mouse coimplantation model that can measure the long-distance migration of human RA synoviocytes and cartilage destruction induced by these cells.

• Journal of Acupuncture Research
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• v.19 no.5
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• pp.189-198
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• 2002

Objective : To research the trend of the study related to rheumatoid arthritis(RA) and to establish the hereafter direction of the study on RA. Methods : We have selected 12 medical report about RA in Arthritis & Rheumatism and Journal of Rheumatology recently, reviewed them, and investigated their methods. Results & Conclusions : The pattern of study was as follows: physical & serologic research in 2 articles, immunologic research in 7 articles, and genetic research in 3 articles. There is now evidence of the benefit of treatment early in the disease course and evidence of the impact of treatment on outcomes. New classes of therapeutic agents have also been introduced. Wherever possible, these revised guidelines are evidence-based. By the above results, it would be needed further research on RA mechanism related immunologic and genetic process.

• IMMUNE NETWORK
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.44-51
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• 2016

Dendritic cells (DCs) are professional antigen presenting cells, and play an important role in the induction of antigen-specific adaptive immunity. However, some DC populations are involved in immune regulation and immune tolerance. These DC populations are believed to take part in the control of immune exaggeration and immune disorder, and maintain immune homeostasis in the body. Tolerogenic DCs (tolDCs) can be generated in vitro by genetic or pharmacological modification or by controlling the maturation stages of cytokine-derived DCs. These tolDCs have been investigated for the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis (RA) in experimental animal models. In the last decade, several in vitro and in vivo approaches have been translated into clinical trials. As of 2015, three tolDC trials for RA are on the list of ClinicalTrial.gov (www.clinicaltrials.gov). Other trials for RA are in progress and will be listed soon. In this review, we discuss the evolution of tolDC-based immunotherapy for RA and its limitations and future prospects.

• Korean Journal of Clinical Pharmacy
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• v.27 no.3
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• pp.195-197
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• 2017

A 74-year-old man suffering from cryptogenic organizing pneumonia (OP) visited our department with arthralgia accompanied with partial swellings of proximal interphalangeal and metacarpophalangeal joints with morning stiffness. A diagnose of rheumatoid arthritis (RA) was made. It was thought that OP was associated with RA. We initiated a treatment with salazosulfapyridine and loxoprofen for RA. Although this treatment was effective, it was discontinued due to the development of drug eruption. As an alternative, the patient was treated with prednisolone (PSL) and clarithromycin (CAM). This treatment demonstrated being effective for OP and RA, to a certain extent; however, the RA activity was not completely suppressed. In order to suppress the RA activity further, tacrolimus (TAC) was successfully added with increasing the dosage of CAM that is assumed to raise blood TAC concentrations. The present case shows that treatment with PSL, CAM and TAC may be effective in some cases of RA.

• Journal of Korean Neurosurgical Society
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• v.59 no.6
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• pp.590-596
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• 2016

Objective : Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is a systemic disease that can affect the cervical spine, especially the atlantoaxial region. The present study evaluated the risk factors for atlantoaxial subluxation (AAS) development and progression in patients who have undergone surgical treatment. Methods : We retrospectively analyzed the data of 62 patients with RA and surgically treated AAS between 2002 and 2015. Additionally, we identified 62 patients as controls using propensity score matching of sex and age among 12667 RA patients from a rheumatology registry between 2007 and 2015. We extracted patient data, including sex, age at diagnosis, age at surgery, disease duration, radiographic hand joint changes, and history of methotrexate use, and laboratory data, including presence of rheumatoid factor and the C-reactive protein (CRP) level. Results : The mean patient age at diagnosis was 38.0 years. The mean time interval between RA diagnosis and AAS surgery was $13.6{\pm}7.0$ years. The risk factors for surgically treated AAS development were the serum CRP level (p=0.005) and radiographic hand joint erosion (p=0.009). The risk factors for AAS progression were a short time interval between RA diagnosis and radiographic hand joint erosion (p<0.001) and young age at RA diagnosis (p=0.04). Conclusion : The CRP level at RA diagnosis and a short time interval between RA diagnosis and radiographic hand joint erosion might be risk factors for surgically treated AAS development in RA patients. Additionally, a short time interval between RA diagnosis and radiographic hand joint erosion and young age at RA diagnosis might be risk factors for AAS progression.

• Journal of muscle and joint health
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• v.5 no.1
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• pp.110-119
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• 1998

In an effort to obtain preventive, diagnostic and therpeutic medical and exercise training information of rheumatoid arthritis as well as to provide pertinent data to be used in development of exercise program for the management of rheumatoid arthritis, this study was conducted by using literature review. Because RA is a disease that involves both joints and muscles, its activity in the different functional classes influences the patient's ability to exercise. A patient in Functional Class 1 may perform any type of exercise because the disease involvement has not yet reached major importance. Exceptions may include hard physical exercise, running, and individual racket sports. In almost all cases, bicycle exercise is possible. Patients in Functional Class 2 and a few in Class 3 can perform most types of exercise (especially cycling, walking, heated pool exercise and even jogging) in low activity phases of RA. Although a few patients in Functional Class 3 can walk, jog, and perform similar types of exercise, most persons in this class can swim or exercise on a bicycle if the type of exercise, its intensity, and its range of motion are modified according to the patient's anatomic and pathologic conditions. Most patients in Functional Class 4 are not able to carry out complicated movements. We conclude that physical training for persons with RA has physical, psychological, and social consequences that are clearly beneficial. We recommend training be one part of the many involved in the complicated treatment of RA.

• Advances in Traditional Medicine
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• v.5 no.4
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• pp.251-261
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• 2005

Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is an autoimmune/inflammatory disorder with a complex genetic component. RA is characterized by chronic inflammation of the synovial membrane in the joint, which leads to the progressive destruction of articular cartilage, ligament and bone. Several cytokines such as tumor necrosis $factor-{\alpha}\;TNF-{\alpha}\;and\;interleukin-1{\beta}\;(IL-1{\beta})$ and interleukin-6 (IL-6) have been implicated in the pathological mechanisms of synovial tissue proliferation, joint destruction and programmed cell death in rheumatoid joint. Genome wide screening of subjects suffering from autoimmune diseases especially arthritis revealed linkage to inflammatory molecules like $TNF-{\alpha},\;IL-1{\beta}$ and IL-6, inducible nitric oxide synthase (iNOS), cyclooxygenase-2 (COX-2), nuclear factor-kappaB $(NF-{\kappa}B)$ and human leucocyte antigen/major histocompatibility complex (HLA/MHC) locus. The status of the pharmacological mechanism of herbal drugs in the light of genome wide screening results has been discussed to reinforce the therapeutic potential and the pharmacological basis of the herbal drugs.

• Journal of Physiology & Pathology in Korean Medicine
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• v.31 no.6
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• pp.328-333
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• 2017

Desomodii Herba (DH) has been shown to exhibit pharmacologyical activities, such as increase myocaridal contraction and secretion of hepatic bile. DH is used to reduce pain caused by rheumatoid arthritis(RA) in Korean medicine. However, the DH exact(DHE) effect and mechanism on rheumatoid arthritis are unknown. In this study, we aimed at the inhibitory effect of DHE on rheumatoid arthritis, and investigated the effect in collagen-induced mice arthritis model and TNF-${\alpha}$ induced MMP-1 and MMP-3 expression including the molecular basis in rheumatoid arthritis synovial fibroblasts (RASFs).The effect of DHE on RA was measured by clinical scoring system. In RASFs, expression of MMP-1 and MMP-3 was assessed by Western blotting and real-time PCR. Also, Western blotting used to evaluate the phosphorylation levels of p38, ERK and JNK and activation of NF-${\kappa}B$ and AP-1. Our results showed that DHE reduced collagen-induced arthritis in mice. DHE inhibits TNF-${\alpha}$ induced MMP-1 and MMP-3 expression and mRNA levels in RASFs. The inhibitory effect of DHE was mediated by the inhibition of the AP-1/JNK signaling pathway. Taken together, our results suggest that the DHE may have preventive potential for rheumatoid arthritis.