Agglutination Reactions in Rheumatoid Arthritis

Abstract

Abstract In the preceding paper (1) it was shown that sera from the majority of patients with rheumatoid arthritis possess the property of agglutinating various strains of hemolytic streptococci to an extraordinarily high titer. No correlation was observed between the source of the strains and their agglutinability in the sera of rheumatoid arthritis patients. It was further shown that a variety of strains of other Gram-positive cocci were not agglutinated in a titer which was at all comparable with that obtained with strains of Streptococcus hemolyticus. An exception to this rule was observed in the case of strains of R pneumococci which were agglutinated in a titer almost as high as were strains of Streptococcus hemolyticus. In the present communication the nature of the agglutination phenomenon is analyzed and its possible significance is discussed. Analysis of Patients Examined. Early in the course of studies on the sera of rheumatoid arthritis patients it was observed that the agglutination phenomenon with hemolytic streptococci was subject to the widest variations.