In addition, six variants rs2736340, rs7812879, rs13277113, rs2618479, rs2254546 and rs2248932 in the intergenic region between the FAM167A and BLK genes are the common risk factors for systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) [15–17], rheumatoid arthritis (RA) [18, 19], systemic sclerosis (SSc) [20] and primary sjögren’s syndrome (pSS) [21, 22] identified by GWAS and candidate gene association studies in Caucasian and Asian populations. This evidence concerns the gene BLK and rheumatoid arthritis.