Testing for antibodies that target citrullinated tenascin-C (cTNC) could diagnose RA in around 50% of cases, including some cases not identified by current best tests. It also has a very low rate of false positives – 98% accurate at ruling out RA.
When inflammation occurs in the body, some proteins are altered in a process called citrullination. These altered forms can cause an autoimmune attack and RA. For that reason, tests that spot antibodies to citrullinated proteins are already used to diagnose the disease. While tests for individual proteins usually have a relatively low diagnostic sensitivity, a more general test called CCP, that detects synthetic citrullinated peptides, identifies a lot more RA cases.
Dr Anja Schwenzer said: ‘We knew that tenascin-C is found at high levels in the...
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