Infliximab treatment reduces depressive symptoms in patients with ankylosing spondylitis: an ancillary study to a randomized controlled trial (ASSERT).

Background: Patients with ankylosing spondylitis (AS) are at increased risk of depression. This increased risk has been hypothesized to be solely secondary due to AS-related symptoms, or additionally due to a common inflammatory pathway. From a clinical perspective, it is important to know whether treatment with tumor necrosis factor alpha inhibitors reduces depressive symptoms, while from a pathophysiological point of view, it would be insightful to understand whether such an effect would be a direct result of reduced inflammation, the result of reduced AS-related symptoms, or both.

How do patients with systemic sclerosis experience currently provided healthcare and how should we measure its quality?

Objectives: To gain insight into SSc patients' perspective on quality of care and to survey their preferred quality indicators.

Methods: An online questionnaire about healthcare setting, perceived quality of care (CQ index) and quality indicators, was sent to 2093 patients from 13 Dutch hospitals.

Results: Six hundred and fifty patients (mean age 59 years, 75% women, 32% limited cutaneous SSc, 20% diffuse cutaneous SSc) completed the questionnaire.

Development of a scoring method to visually score cortical interruptions on high-resolution peripheral quantitative computed tomography in rheumatoid arthritis and healthy controls.

Objectives: To develop a scoring method to visually score cortical interruptions in finger joints on High-Resolution peripheral Quantitative Computed Tomography (HR-pQCT), determine its intra- and inter-reader reliability and test its feasibility.

Methods: The scoring method was developed by integrating results from in-depth discussions with experts, consensus meetings, multiple reading experiments and the literature. Cortical interruptions were scored by two independent readers in an imaging dataset with finger joints from patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and healthy controls and assessed for adjacent trabecular distortion.

Structural damage and inflammation on radiographs or magnetic resonance imaging are associated with cortical interruptions on high-resolution peripheral quantitative computed tomography: a study in finger joints of patients with rheumatoid arthritis and healthy subjects.

Objectives: To study the relationship between structural damage and inflammatory features on magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) or radiography and other risk factors [anti-citrullinated protein antibody (ACPA) and/or rheumatoid factor (RF) seropositivity, hand dominance, disease duration] and the presence or number of cortical interruptions in finger joints on high-resolution peripheral quantitative computed tomography (HR-pQCT).

Method: Finger joints of 38 healthy subjects and 39 patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) were examined through radiographs, MRI, and HR-pQCT. Radiographs were scored according to the Sharp/van der Heijde (SvH) method; MRI for the presence of cortical interruptions, bone marrow oedema (BMO), and synovitis; and HR-pQCT images for cortical interruptions.

Construct Validity of Radiographs of the Feet to Assess Joint Damage in Patients with Gout.

Objective: To investigate construct validity of radiographic damage of the feet in gout.

Methods: Radiographs of the feet were scored using the Sharp/van der Heijde method. Factors associated with damage were investigated by a negative binomial model, and contribution of damage to health by linear regressions.

Psoriasiform disorders with joint symptoms.

We present a 49-year-old man seen at the dermatology outpatient department with a 3-year history of painful swollen digits of hands and feet. On enquiry he reported dysuria. On examination we saw extensive swelling of the digits, keratosis of the nails, and some psoriasiform skin lesions on the soles of the feet.

Characterisation and potential diagnostic value of circulating matrix Gla protein (MGP) species.

Matrix γ-carboxyglutamate (Gla) protein (MGP) is an important local inhibitor of vascular calcification, which can undergo two post-translational modifications: vitamin K-dependent γ-glutamate carboxylation and serine phosphorylation. While carboxylation is thought to have effects upon binding of calcium-ions, phosphorylation is supposed to affect the cellular release of MGP. Since both modifications can be exerted incompletely, various MGP species can be detected in the circulation.

C5 deficiency in a patient with primary Sjögren's syndrome.

We report a case of C5 deficiency in combination with Sjögren's syndrome (SS). Our patient presented with polyarthritis and complaints of oral and ocular dryness. In the serum there was a very low titer of total hemolytic complement (CH50) due to a deficiency of the fifth complement component.