Infection Factors Which Have a Role in the Aetiopathogenesis of Primary and Exacerbation Juvenile Idiopathic Arthritis and the Relationship of Infection Factors with Procalcitonin Levels

摘要

The aetiopathogenesis of Juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA) is not fully understood; however, environmental factors including immunological tendency, infections stress and trauma in patients have been shown to play a role in the aetiopathogenesis of JIA. Although previous studies have shown that there was a clear relationship between adult arthritis and infections, this relationship was not fully demonstrated between juvenile arthritis and infections. Our work is the first international study in effort to show the relationship between juvenile group and infections by investigating extended bacterial and viral factors and monitoring procalcitonin (PCT) and C-reactive protein (CRP) levels in relevant infections.The study was performed between October 2004 and November 2005.