RHEUMATOID ARTHRITIS ETIOLOGY Rheumatoid arthritis is a disease of unknown causation. Many theories of causation have been proposed but none has withstood critical evaluation. Some known facts are that it has a slight tendency to be familial; the sex incidence in peripheral rheumatoid arthritis is 3 women to 1 man, and 80 per cent of the cases occur between the ages of 25 to 50, with the peak at 35 to 40. According to a number of current theories, rheumatoid arthritis is variously claimed to be (1) an infectious disease, (2) a metabolic disease, (3) a disease with an endocrinologic basis, (4) a disease of the peripheral circulatory apparatus, (5) a disease of the nervous system, (6) a psychogenic disease and (7) a disease of hypersensitivity. Such a list as this indicates how little actually is known about the cause of rheumatoid arthritis. PATHOLOGY Rheumatoid arthritis is invariably described as
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A COMMITTEE OF THE AMERICAN RHEUMATISM ASSOCIATION (1949) studied this question.