IFI44L and rheumatoid arthritis: However, numerous studies found that IFI44L was hypomethylated in SLE patients [20–22], and recently Zhao et al. proposed that IFI44L promoter methylation can be used as a biomarker for distinguishing patients with SLE from healthy controls, and also other autoimmune diseases such as primary Sjögren’s syndrome and rheumatoid arthritis [56].