Clinical, laboratory and instrumental characteristics in patients with rheumatoid arthritis with "ground glass opacity" computed tomographic symptom of interstitial lung disease
Rheumatoid arthritis is an inflammatory rheumatic disease with unknown etiology characterized by symmetric, chronic and erosive arthritis (synovitis) of the peripheral joints and systemic inflammatory involvement of the viscera. Lung pathology, including interstitial lung disease, is one of the common extra-articular manifestations at the гheumatoid arthritis. The leading diagnosis method of interstitial lung disease is a computed tomography high resolution, which allows to identifying interstitial lung changes in 70% of the cases. The study of prognosis in patients with rheumatoid arthritis interstitial lung disease has been the subject of several studies in the past decade. In most studies it was stated that the average life expectancy from diagnosis is around 3 years. This work is devoted to study of interstitial lung disease as one of the most frequent extra-articular ma-nifestations of rheumatoid arthritis. The authors defined the significance of computed tomography high resolu-tion for the diagnosis of pulmonary interstitial lung changes at rheumatoid arthritis. They give comparative clini-cal and immunological, instrumental characteristics of rheumatoid arthritis patients with interstitial lung disease and without it. The role of smoking and positivity of anti-cyclic citrullinated peptide (anti-CCP) according to antibodies are determined as risk factors of interstitial lung disease development in patients with rheumatoid arthritis. The interrelation of the X-ray tomography symptom of interstitial lung disease "ground glass opacity" with the activity and duration of rheumatoid arthritis is revealed. "Ground glass opacity" symptom is associated with high index of DAS28 in patients with rheumatoid arthritis with interstitial lung disease.