Role of Interleuken-6 & Tumor necrosis factor – α in Rheumatoid arthritis Patients in Nassiriyah governorate

Abstract

SUMMARYThe present study has been done in Al-Nassiriyha, southern Iraq, from December 2006 to August 2007,designed to determine the role of Interleuken-6 and Tumor necrosis factor – α in a group of patients with rheumatoid arthritis for specific period of time and healthy controls, and to show the diagnostic value of IL-6 and TNF-α in relation to rheumatoid factor (RF) to discriminate between those patients with and without RA . Blood samples were taken from 121 patients with rheumatoid arthritis from AL-Hussein Teaching Hospital in AL-Nassiriyah and 120 healthy controls from medical personnel and school students who were healthy . All the information were taken from the patients and controls. An Enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay was used for estimation IL-6, TNF-α and slide agglutination test for the estimation of RF. The seropositivity to IL-6 and TNF-α and RF in patients with rheumatoid arthritis was ( 60% , 56.1% and 57% respectively ) .The study revealed that specificity of TNF- alpha was higher than IL-6 and RF ( 96.6 % , 92.5 % and 81.6 respectively ) .