Antilipoprotein antibodies in rheumatoid arthritis.

Antibodies against very low-density lipoproteins and low-density lipoproteins (aLA) were found in 26 of 69 (38%) patients with active rheumatoid arthritis (RA) but not in any control subjects (ie, 40 patients with psoriatic arthritis, 21 patients with osteoarthritis, and 65 healthy blood donors). In 21 RA patients (30%), lipoproteins were found in the dissociated components of circulating immune complexes. RA patients with aLA had significantly decreased cholesterol levels in all lipoprotein fractions and total serum lipids, while serum triglycerides were significantly increased compared with RA patients without aLA.

[Ixodes ricinus proven as a vector of Lyme borreliosis in Yugoslavia].

263 fasting female Ixodes ricinus were examined for Borrelia burgorferi, the vector of Lyme borreliosis. Female ticks were collected by flagella in the biotopes (Belgrade and Osijek) in which ticks bite patients with Lyme borreliosis. Borrelia burgorferi was proved in 58 (22%) of 263 female ticks in the native preparations of the intestinal contents by darkfield microscopy.

[Reaction of the injured organism to infection].

Authors have examined degree of the immune response to experimentally inoculated agent in the early (6 hours) and late (7 days) phase of the organism response to thermal injury in BALB/c rats divided into two experimental groups and three control groups (only infected, only burnt and intact). Brucella abortus bovis of VA-19 species known as a good immune response stimulator in the host was i.p.