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Alcohol consumption protects against arthritis development in seropositive arthralgia patients
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Patients with arthralgia and auto-antibodies such as anticitrullinated protein antibodies and/or IgM-rheumatoid factor (seropositive) are at risk for developing rheumatoid arthritis (RA).1 RA is associated with lower alcohol intake, suggesting that alcohol consumption is protective for the development of RA.2,–,5 The proposed mechanism for this effect is that alcohol is immunosuppressive, possibly via intrinsic corticosteroid production. In animal …
Footnotes
Funding The Dutch Arthritis Association.
Competing interests None.
Ethics approval Approval provided by the Ethics Committee of Reade and Slotervaart hospital, Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.