How one inflammatory disorder exacerbates another

As reported by Eureka Alert, “in a mouse model, the team demonstrated that recipients of a bone marrow transplant were predisposed to more severe arthritis if their donor had inflammatory gum disease.”

“Although we use periodontitis and arthritis as our model, our findings go above and beyond these examples,” says George Hajishengallis, a professor in Penn Dental Medicine and a corresponding author on the work. “This is in fact a central mechanism, a unifying principle underlying the association between a variety of comorbidities.”

The media outlet also reported that “The researchers note that this mechanism may also prompt a reconsideration of how bone marrow donors are selected, as donors with certain types of immune memory caused by underlying inflammatory conditions might put bone marrow transplant recipients at a higher risk of inflammatory disorders.”