[Various clinical and instrumental parallels in the condition of the lungs and heart in patients with rheumatoid arthritis].

Comparative clinical and instrumental examination of 33 patients with seronegative and 67 patients with seropositive rheumatoid arthritis (RA) has revealed that patients with seropositive RA often manifest the functional and roentgenomorphological signs of lung damage. Pulmonary lesions related pathogenetically to RA were encountered equally often in patients of both groups, whereas those caused by concomitant chronic nonspecific pulmonary diseases were more characteristic of patients with seropositive RA apparently because of a more powerful suppression of immunity. In addition, in spite of the fact that the latter patients did not make any complaints on the part of the heart, they did manifest abnormalities of the phase structure of the cardiac cycle and central hemodynamics.