Development of collagen-induced arthritis in male Sprague-Dawley rats using type ii chicken collagen and complete Freund’s adjuvant

Abstract

This study established a collagen-induced arthritis (CIA) model in 18 male Sprague-Dawley rats using chicken type II collagen and Complete Freund’s Adjuvant (CFA) to investigate rheumatoid arthritis and evaluate a potential treatment. The rats were divided into control and treatment groups and monitored for swelling, redness, movement, paw edema, arthritis scores, radiographic changes, and inflammatory markers. Arthritis-induced rats showed noticeable joint inflammation, reduced movement, paw edema, and bone erosion compared with controls. Although IL-6 and CRP levels remained below the detection thresholds in the tested samples, the overall findings indicate that the induction protocol successfully produced an inflammatory arthritis phenotype suitable for evaluating anti-arthritic treatments.