Mycoplasma Organisms in Synovial Fluid from Rheumatic Joints

Abstract

Summary Observations are reviewed which suggest that venereal infection may be a factor contributing to the development of Reiter's syndrome and related types of arthritis. Of the agents which may be thus transmitted, the so-called pleuropneumonia-like or mycoplasma organisms are those most likely to be involved. Bloodborne spread of the organisms may be assumed to underly the articular manifestations, since their presence in the synovial fluid of arthritic joints has occasionally been demonstrated culturally by a number of investigators. In the present study, mycoplasma-like organisms were found on culture of synovial fluid in 5 of 16 cases of so-called venereal arthritis and in 7 of 9 other cases of polyarthritis which could not be classified as rheumatoid arthritis. On the other hand, 12 cases of definite rheumatoid arthritis were culturally negative. These results add 12 more cases culturally positive for mycoplasma to the roughly 19 which have been reported by other investigators, but they permit of no definite conclusions regarding the relation of mycoplasma organisms to human polyarthritis.