HLA‐DP in rheumatoid arthritis

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Abstract
Frequencies of HLA‐DR, Dw and DPw specificities were compared between rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients, Felly's syndrome (FS) patients and normal controls. It was confirmed that the frequency of DR4 was increased in RA patients (54% (n = 111) vs 23% (n = 272), relative risk (RR) = 3.98, P + RA patients compared to DR4+ controls (28% (n = 32) vs 11% (n = 47), RR = 3.29, P ‐ RA patients (RR = 0.33, P + RA patients (RR = 0.69, NS). In FS patients, 96% of whom were DR4+, decreased DPw1 was very marked, whereas the frequency of DPw3 was unaltered compared to DR4+ normals. These alterations in frequencies were not caused by linkage disequilibria between HLA‐DR and ‐DP alleles. Thus, taken together, these data suggest that, in the presence of the major DR4‐associated “susceptibility” gene(s) for RA, DPw1 may have “protective” effects, whereas in the absence of DR4, the presence of DPw3 has significant “protective” activity.