Researchers at the College of Pharmacy, University of Basrah; Prof. Dr. Iman Tariq Ali, Prof. Dr. Falah Hassan Shari, and researcher Ahmed Taha Yassin, published a scientific research titled "Comparative Analyses of Immune Marker Levels in Seronegative and Seropositive Iraqi Rheumatoid Arthritis Patients" in the Journal of the Iraqi Association for Medical Research and Studies.

The research aims to evaluate the potential for increased risk in rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients suffering from seronegativity for common markers by measuring serum levels of CCN4, VCAM-1, MMP-3, and GM-CSF in seropositive and seronegative RA patients and their relationship to disease activity.

The retrospective study was conducted from October 2022 to July 2023, involving a group of 250 adult males and females aged between 20 and 73 years. The study proved direct proportional correlations between DAS28 ESR levels and CCN4, VCAM1, MMP3, GM-CSF, and DAS28 CRP levels in rheumatoid arthritis patients.

The research concluded that seronegative RA patients showed higher disease activity compared to their seropositive counterparts. Additionally, the elevated levels of CCN4, VCAM-1, MMP-3, and GM-CSF demonstrated their value as markers for predicting disease stages and diagnostic classification for individuals at risk of developing rheumatoid arthritis.

The findings emphasized the clinical implications of these biomarkers in disease management more strongly. The four immune molecules examined in this study showed reliability and effectiveness as biological markers for monitoring and predicting RA activity, as well as joint and bone damage in seronegative RA patients.