Molecular Assay of Staphylococcal Enterotoxin E in Synovial Fluid of Patients with Rheumatoid Arthritis

[Background]The role of Staphylococcal enterotoxin E (Superantigen E) in rheumatoid arthritis pathogenesis has been considered. This paper aimed at determining Staphylococcal enterotoxin E in the synovial fluid of rheumatoid arthritis patients.[Methods]In this study, 100 synovial fluid samples of patients with rheumatoid arthritis were examined. The primers pairs were designed based on the S. baureus enterotoxin type E (entE) gene, GenBank: M21319.1. All samples were subjected to DNA extraction separately. Then, polymerase chain reaction (PCR) was implemented. Data were analyzed by descriptive statistics.[Results]The PCR results indicated that Staphylococcal enterotoxin E gene existed in synovial fluid samples of 25% of patients with rheumatoid arthritis, with a high percentage.[Conclusions]The study results revealed that a high percentage of patients with rheumatoid arthritis have Staphylococcal enterotoxin type E gene in their synovial fluid. However, further studies are needed to assess other Staphylococcal enterotoxins. This finding may provide a model for diagnosing rheumatoid arthritis disease. The results of this study have presented some evidence regarding endogenous origin of involved superantigen in patients with rheumatoid arthritis.