MONOCLONAL-ANTIBODIES FOR IMMUNOINTERVENT ION IN RHEUMATOID-ARTHRITIS

Rheumatoid arthritis is a chronic inflammatory disease mainly affectin g the joints. The etiology is still unknown, but it shows several clin ical and laboratory features of an autoimmune process. The conventiona l medical therapy consisting of a combination of analgetic and antiphl ogistic agents with so called slow acting drugs is often not satisfact ory and fails to persistently suppress disease activity. Therefore, th erapeutic alternatives are necessary which are provided by a new gener ation of immunosuppressing agents including monoclonal antibodies. Thi s paper will summarize some therapeutic approaches using monoclonal an tibodies towards cell surface antigens or soluble mediators of inflamm ation for therapy of rheumatoid arthritis.