Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is an autoimmune and chronic inflammatory disorder that mostly affects the synovial joints and can promote both cartilage and bone tissue destruction. Several conservative treatments are available to relieve pain and control the inflammation; however, traditional drugs administration are not fully effective and present severe undesired side effects. Hydrogels are a very attractive platform as a drug delivery system to guarantee these handicaps are reduced, and the therapeutic effect from the drugs is maximized. Furthermore, hydrogels can mimic the physiological microenvironment and have the mechanical behavior needed for use as cartilage in vitro model. The testing of these advanced delivery systems is still bound to animal disease models that have shown low predictability. Alternatively, hydrogel-based human dynamic in vitro systems can be used to model diseases, bypassing some of the animal testing problems. RA dynamic disease models are still in an embryonary stage since advances regarding healthy and inflamed cartilage models are currently giving the first steps regarding complexity increase. Herein, recent studies using hydrogels in the treatment of RA, featuring different hydrogel formulations are discussed. Besides, their use as artificial extracellular matrices in dynamic in vitro articular cartilage is also reviewed.

类风湿性关节炎 (RA) 是一种自身免疫性和慢性炎症性疾病，主要影响滑膜关节，可促进软骨和骨组织破坏。有几种保守治疗可以缓解疼痛和控制炎症；然而，传统的药物给药并不完全有效并且存在严重的不良副作用。水凝胶是一个非常有吸引力的平台，作为一种药物输送系统，可以保证减少这些障碍，并最大限度地发挥药物的治疗效果。此外，水凝胶可以模拟生理微环境，并具有用作体外软骨模型所需的机械行为。这些先进的递送系统的测试仍然与显示出低可预测性的动物疾病模型有关。或者，基于水凝胶的人体动态体外系统可用于模拟疾病，绕过一些动物试验问题。RA 动态疾病模型仍处于萌芽阶段，因为有关健康和发炎软骨模型的进展目前正在迈出复杂性增加的第一步。在此，讨论了最近使用水凝胶治疗 RA 的研究，这些研究具有不同的水凝胶配方。此外，还综述了它们在动态体外关节软骨中作为人工细胞外基质的用途。讨论了最近使用水凝胶治疗 RA 的研究，以不同的水凝胶配方为特色。此外，还综述了它们在动态体外关节软骨中作为人工细胞外基质的用途。讨论了最近使用水凝胶治疗 RA 的研究，以不同的水凝胶配方为特色。此外，还综述了它们在动态体外关节软骨中作为人工细胞外基质的用途。