s31_ab23

Early rheumatoid arthritis in African-Americans: The CLEAR Registry

S.L. Bridges Jr.^1,2,3, L.B. Hughes^1,3, T.R. Mikuls⁶, G. Howard⁴, H.K. Tiwari^4,5, G.S. Alarcón^1,3, J.M. McNicholl^1,2 and L.W. Moreland^1,3 for the CLEAR Investigators

¹Department of Medicine and ²Department of Microbiology, ³Division of Clinical Immunology and Rheumatology, ⁴Department of Biostatistics, School of Public Health, ⁵Department of Pathology, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, Alabama; and ⁶University of Nebraska Medical Center and Omaha VA Medical Center, Omaha, Nebraska.

ABSTRACT
African-Americans have been under-represented in genetic studies of rheu-matoid arthritis (RA) susceptibiltiy and severity. Genetic and non-genetic factors influencing the radiographic severity of RA and its response to treatment are poorly understood, particularly in African-Americans. The Consortium for the Longitudinal Evaluation of African-Americans with early RA (CLEAR) Registry, a collaborative effort among four institutions in the southeast USA, will hopefully provide a useful resource to study these issues.

Key words
Rheumatoid arthritis, African-Americans, genetics.

Please address correspondence and reprint requests to: S. Louis Bridges, Jr., MD, PhD, Associate Professor, Departments of Medicine and Microbiology, Division of Clinical Immu-nology and Rheumatology, University of Alabama at Birmingham, 415 Lyons-Harrison Research Building, 701 19th Street South, Birmingham, Alabama 35294-0007, USA.
E-mail: lbridges@uab.edu