News Releases & Research Results Identification of a risk locus for interstitial lung disease complicating rheumatoid arthritis, as well as its association with chest CT image patterns related to pulmonary fibrosis

The results of the collaborative research project conducted by Graduate Student Yuya Shirai and Professor Yukinori Okada (genetic statistics) of the Osaka University Graduate School of Medicine, Professor Yoichiro Kamatani of the University of Tokyo Graduate School of Frontier Sciences, and others.

• The research group conducted an analysis of genomic data of approximately 5,000 rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients with or without interstitial lung disease (ILD) from the Institute of Rheumatology Rheumatoid Arthritis (IORRA) cohort at the Tokyo Women’s Medical University and BioBank Japan (BBJ). The group successfully identified a gene locus related to rheumatoid arthritis–interstitial lung disease (RA-ILD).
  • Furthermore, stratified analysis based on CT image patterns revealed a strong association between the identified variant and the CT image patterns reflecting pulmonary fibrosis.
  • The results of this research should facilitate the elucidation of the pathology of RA-ILD.

This research project was conducted with the support of the Practical Research Project for Allergic Diseases and Immunology by AMED.

The results of this research project were published online in Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases, a British scientific journal, on August 1.

Shirai Y, et al. Association of the RPA3-UMAD1 locus with interstitial lung diseases complicated with rheumatoid arthritis in Japanese Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases
DOI：10.1136/annrheumdis-2020-217256