Center for Genomic Medicine, Kyoto University Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto, Japan.
Department of the Control for Rheumatic Diseases, Kyoto University Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto, Japan.
PLoS One. 2014 Jan 15;9(1):e85376. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0085376. eCollection 2014.
Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is a bone destructive autoimmune disease. Many patients with RA recognize fluctuations of their joint synovitis according to changes of air pressure, but the correlations between them have never been addressed in large-scale association studies. To address this point we recruited large-scale assessments of RA activity in a Japanese population, and performed an association analysis. Here, a total of 23,064 assessments of RA activity from 2,131 patients were obtained from the KURAMA (Kyoto University Rheumatoid Arthritis Management Alliance) database. Detailed correlations between air pressure and joint swelling or tenderness were analyzed separately for each of the 326 patients with more than 20 assessments to regulate intra-patient correlations. Association studies were also performed for seven consecutive days to identify the strongest correlations. Standardized multiple linear regression analysis was performed to evaluate independent influences from other meteorological factors. As a result, components of composite measures for RA disease activity revealed suggestive negative associations with air pressure. The 326 patients displayed significant negative mean correlations between air pressure and swellings or the sum of swellings and tenderness (p = 0.00068 and 0.00011, respectively). Among the seven consecutive days, the most significant mean negative correlations were observed for air pressure three days before evaluations of RA synovitis (p = 1.7 × 10(-7), 0.00027, and 8.3 × 10(-8), for swellings, tenderness and the sum of them, respectively). Standardized multiple linear regression analysis revealed these associations were independent from humidity and temperature. Our findings suggest that air pressure is inversely associated with synovitis in patients with RA.
类风湿关节炎（RA）是一种破坏性的自身免疫性疾病。许多 RA 患者根据气压变化感知关节滑膜炎的波动，但这些变化之间的相关性从未在大规模关联研究中得到探讨。为了解决这一问题，我们对日本人群中的 RA 活动进行了大规模评估，并进行了关联分析。在此，从 KURAMA（京都大学类风湿关节炎管理联盟）数据库中获得了 2131 名患者共 23064 次 RA 活动评估。为了调节患者内相关性，我们分别对 326 名评估次数超过 20 次的患者的关节肿胀或压痛与气压之间的详细相关性进行了分析。还对连续七天进行了关联研究，以确定最强的相关性。采用标准化多元线性回归分析评估其他气象因素的独立影响。结果显示，RA 疾病活动综合指标的组成部分与气压呈负相关。326 名患者的气压与肿胀或肿胀与压痛之和之间呈显著负相关（p = 0.00068 和 0.00011）。在连续七天中，在评估 RA 滑膜炎前三天的气压与肿胀、压痛和肿胀与压痛之和的平均负相关最显著（p = 1.7×10(-7)、0.00027 和 8.3×10(-8)）。标准化多元线性回归分析显示，这些相关性与湿度和温度无关。我们的研究结果表明，气压与 RA 患者的滑膜炎呈负相关。
