Study of serum traditional and nontraditional biomarkers in Rheumatoid arthritis patients

Abstract

The study of biomarkers in Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is highly indispensable to understand mechanisms of pathogenesis, diagnosis, prognosis, and treatment of disease. The role of traditional biomarkers like Anti-CCP, RF, and inflammatory markers like ESR and CRP is well established. In this study, we aimed to measure nontraditional biomarkers like Hyaluronic acid (HA), Cartilage oligomeric matrix protein (COMP), and Osteocalcin in the serum of RA patients and also to establish an association with traditional markers. It was a cross-sectional study involving 152 RA patients based on the 1987 ACR criteria for the diagnosis of RA and 68 age‑ and sex-matched healthy controls. After the clinical examination, traditional markers were assessed to measure the disease activity along with non traditional markers in RA patients. All the values were expressed as median (25th–75th percentile). In our study, there was a significant increase in serum HA levels in RA patients compared to healthy controls (p < 0.03), whereas no significant difference in serum COMP and osteocalcin levels. The traditional inflammatory markers were significantly increased in RA patients than controls with (p < 0.001). The serum HA levels were significantly correlated with traditional markers in RA patients. Conclusion: Significant increase in serum HA level in RA patients indicating synovial inflammation, but there were no notable changes in COMP and osteocalcin level in serum presuming the combination of these markers may be useful along with traditional markers in the different stages of RA.