Hello and welcome to the Zero to Finals podcast.

My name is Tom and in this episode I'm going to be talking to you about rheumatoid arthritis.

And if you want to follow along with written notes on this topic, you can follow along at

zero tofinals.com slash r a or in the rheumatology section of the zero definals medicine book.

Let's get straight into it.

Rheumatoid arthritis is an autoimmune condition that causes chronic inflammation of the

sinovial lining of the joints, the tendon sheaths and the bursa.

It's an inflammatory arthritis.

Inflammation of the synovial lining is called synovitis.

Rheumatoid arthritis tends to be symmetrical and it affects multiple joints at a time.

So we call it a symmetrical polyarthritis. Inflammation of the tendons increases the risk of

tendon rupture in rheumatoid arthritis. The condition is three times more common in women than in men,

just like other autoimmune conditions. And it most often occurs in middle age, however, it can

occur at any age.

A family history is very relevant as this increases the risk of rheumatoid arthritis.

There are a few key genetic associations.

There's a gene called HLADR4, which is a gene often present in rheumatoid factor positive patients. And there's another H-L-A-D-R-1 gene that occasionally

occurs in rheumatoid arthritis patients as well. Let's talk about antibodies. The key antibody in

rheumatoid arthritis that you really need to remember for your exams and for clinical practice

is rheumatoid factor and rheumatoid factor is an auto antibody that's present in around 70% of

patients with rheumatoid arthritis it's an auto antibody that targets the fc portion of the

i ggg antibody they've got loads of immunoglobulins or antibodies that are floating around the FC portion of the IGG antibody.

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