Study of Latent Matrix Metalloproteinase- 1 Activity in Serum and Synovial Fluid of Patients with Rheumatoid Arthritis

This research was concerned with the measurement of latent matrix metalloproteinase-1 (MMP-1) activity in serum and synovial fluid (SF) of rheumatoid arthritis patients, and evaluation the effect of some factors like gender, age, geographical place and smoking on the enzyme activity. The study included (158) patients (132 female, 26 male) aged from (19-83) year, attending the rheumatology clinic at Ibn Sina teaching hospital in Nineveh Governorate. Sixty healthy volunteers of matched age and gender were utilized as control. The results showed that the activity of enzyme was significantly different between the SF and the serum of patients with RA (586.85 ± 40.89 ng/ml, vs. 249.45 ± 61.11 ng/ml; P< 0001) respectively, and between serum of RA patients and serum of control (249.45 ± 61.11 ng/ml, vs. 125.46± 54.88; P< 001) respectively. The results indicated that the number of rheumatoid arthritis females were more than males by (5) times and it is most common after the age between 40 and 50 years. Moreover, the results showed that the number of patients who live in urban places is higher than that in rural places. The study, also, showed that the enzyme activity was significantly increased among smoker patients. Finally the results showed that there was no significant effect of age, gender and geographic place on the enzyme activity.