A Normal Series for Rheumatoid Serology Collected by Random Sampling

SummarySera from 539 persons above 15 years of age were selected by random sampling from the 10,000 inhabitants in a typical Finnish country town. Clinical examination revealed 19 definite and 31 probable cases of rheumatoid arthritis. The Waaler-Rose test used as serological criterium transferred one probable case to the »definite» group and made two possible cases »probable». The latex test gave much more »non-specifically» positive results than the bentonite or the Waaler-Rose tests, but at least the Singer-Plotz latex test gives considerably more positive results in the case of rheumatoid arthritis than the Waaler-Rose test.