Blood Plasma Fibrinogen in Rheumatic and Non-Rheumatic conditions.

A striking feature in many forms of rheumatic disease is the high sedimentation rate of the erythrocytes. The rate of fall of erythrocytes in plasma may be expressed as sedimentation rate (S.R.), or as suspension stability (S.S.). The S.R. (Westergren, Linzenmeier) is expressed by a figure indicating the fall of the column of the red cells in a 200 mm. tube, while the S.S. is expressed as the height of the column of red cells as a percentage, a wider tube being used.