The relative composition of the inflammatory infiltrate as an additional tool for synovial tissue classification.

Abstract

Traditionally, differences in absolute numbers of cells expressing a certain marker (e.g., positive staining cells per mm(2)) have been used in immunohistological synovial tissue classification. We have begun to evaluate the relative composition of the inflammatory infiltrates, i.e. percentages of inflammatory cell types in inflammatory infiltrates, as an alternate classification tool that may potentially improve tissue diagnostics, subgrouping in clinical trials, and understanding of pathogenesis of inflammatory and noninflammatory arthropathies.