[Various aspects of the chronic course of Reiter's disease]

A comparative clinicolaboratory study of followed-up patients with a chronic (38 patients), acute and lingering (137 patients) course of Reiter's disease was conducted. The role of a persisting focus of infection in the genitourinary organs and genetic predisposition (HLA-B27 was detected in 100% of the cases) in the formation of a chronic variant of disease was shown. Sacroileitis, amyotrophy, bursitis and enthesitis developed more frequently in a chronic than in an acute variant; erosion in the joints was detected in over 40% of the patients. Morphological investigation of the synovial bioptates revealed a picture of chronic synovitis with superficial localization of an inflammatory process.