SEQUENCE-SPECIFIC OLIGONUCLEOTIDE TYPING IN SHONA PATIENTS WITH RHEUMATOID-ARTHRITIS AND HEALTHY CONTROLS FROM ZIMBABWE

Seventy-two patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and 82 controls ha ve been typed with the XI Histocompatibility Workshop DRB1 and DQB1 se quence-specific oligonucleotide probes. The increase of DRB104 corres ponds to an increase of the serologically defined DR4, previously foun d in a small group of Zimbabwean RA patients and we now show that this increase is due to the subtype DRB10405 in association with DQB1*030 2. In addition there is a clearcut increase of DRB11001 equivalent to the serologically defined DR10. There was no increase amongst RA pati ents of DRB10102 which was the predominant DR1 sub-type amongst contr ols. In the course of our investigation, we observed a DRB104 variant which corresponds to DRB10412, newly defined in the XIth Histocompat ibility Workshop.