Intestinal Resorption Of Gold Salts Used For Treatment Of Rheumatoid Arthritis

By irradiating a gold preparation before its ingestion, its resorption from the intestine of 12 patients with rheumatoid arthritis could be studied. The study, additionally, involved an activation analysis. The resorption of the oral gold preparation from the intestine seemed relatively slight compared with that of the 8 control patients, in whom the gold content in blood and urine after the intramuscular injection of water-soluble gold preparation was substantially higher. Hence the therapeutic effect of oral gold preparations seems to be questionable, if this effect is considered to depend, at least partly, on systemic gold concentration. Radioactive gold seemed to accumulate more in joints affected by rheumatoid arthritis than in unaffected joints.Eero Sairanen Department of Rheumatology Etelä-Saimaa Central Hospital Lappeenranta Finland