It is difficult to establish early on the prognosis of patients with recent-onset polyarthritis. We want to know if we can use the length of telomeres in periphjeral blood cells at baseline as a novel prognostic marker.
In order to be able to interpret our observations in arthritis patients over time, we need to compare these results with those observed in normal human controls adjusted for gender and for age groups.
These patients are first screened for the presence of acute or chronic severe diseases (cancer, cardiovascular, articular, et...). They then have genomic DNA extracted from peripheral blood and seen at 3 months interval for a year than annually. At each blood draw, the appearance of acute or chronic diseases is noted.
Read more: http://www.clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT01982890?cond=%22Arthritis%22&lup_s=10/31/2013&lup_d=30
