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Journal of Rheumatology and Medical Rehabilitation, vol.14, no.2, pp.127-140, 2003 (Scopus)
On the basis of associations with microbial infections, arthritides can be divided in to three groups: infective arthritis, reactive arthritis, inflammatory arthritis. Microorganisms known to cause joint diseases include bacteria, viruses fungi and parasites. They may cause arthritis by being present and alive, ie. inducing an active infection, by being present in an inactive or degraded form, by sending metabolites, toxins or other extracellular products from a distant focus or via induction of immunologic mediators. Microbial superantigens, heat shock proteins and molecular mimicry between the target tissue and the inducing microorganism are involved in the pathogenesis of arthritis. In this review, we focus on the role of infections in the ethiopathogenesis of various types of arthritides. In addition, we summarized the experimental microbially induced arthritis models to give insights into pathogenic mechanisms of microbially induced arthritis.