Human Parvovirus B19 and Rheumatoid Arthritis in Korea

Chun, Lae Hee; Kim, Think You

Abstract

BACKGROUND: The pathogenic human parvovirus B19 is the etiologic agent of erythema infectiosum and causes other events including aplastic crisis,hydrops fetalis and fetal loss.Recently,it has been reported in many articles that human parvovirus B19 infection is associated with rheumatoid arthritis (RA).In contrast to these reports from the United Kingdom,Germany,Japan and China,different results were reported that there is no association between human parvovirus B19 and the pathogenesis of RA in Northern Ireland,Finland and France.This study aimed to investigate the association between human parvovirus B19 and RA in Korea.
METHODS
Sera from 104 patients with RA,40 with osteoarthritis (OA)and 32 with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE)were tested for IgG and IgM of human parvovirus B19 by ELISA (Biotrin),respectively.
RESULTS
There were no statistical differences among RA,OA and SLE patients in both anti-human parvovirus B19 IgG and IgM (p>0.05).Human parvovirus B19 IgM was positive in only four RA patients and negative in all SLE and OA patients.
CONCLUSION
Human parvovirus B19 infection showed no association with RA in Korea,which is different from reports from other countries,especially Japan and China which are our neighbors.We thought that this result was due to the ethnic or national differences of baseline titer of anti-human parvovirus B19.Therefore anti-human parvovirus B19 test for RA patients is not necessary in Korea.In conclusion,we suggest that the indication and interpretation of anti-human parvovirus B19 testing in RA patients should be applied differently for each nation.