Clinical characteristics analysis of 1 808 rheumatism in-patients with oral candidiasis / 中华口腔医学杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective@#To analyze the clinical characteristics of oral candidiasis (OC) in in-patients with rheumatism, in order to provide theoretical basis for the prevention and treatment of OC in rheumatism patients.@*Methods@#One thousand eight hundred and eight in-patients were recruited in the Department of Rheumatology, the Second Hospital of Shanxi Medical University from January 2017 to December 2017. The patients included 607 males and 1 201 females. Their average age was (49.5±15.5) years old with a ranging from 14 to 81 years. According to occurrence of OC or not, the patients were divided into OC group and non-OC group. The differences of general data, primary diseases, laboratory examinations, usage of glucocorticoid and immunosuppressant therapy were compared between the two groups, and the risk factors of OC occurrence were analyzed.@*Results@#Two hundred and sixty-nine patients had OC and 1 539 patients had no OC. Age [(54.9±14.7) years], duration of illness [(9.4±4.4) years] and hospital stay [(15.3±5.7) d] in OC group were significantly longer than those in non-OC group. OC incidence in patients with connective tissue disease (CTD) [17.40% (193/1 109)] was higher than that in non-CTD patients [10.87% (75/699)] (P<0.001). OC most likely occurred in patients with such CTD as Sjögren syndrome (SS) and Behcet syndrome. OC incidence in non-CTD patients with osteoarthritis (OA) was highest. The salivary flow rate in OC group [(0.65±0.45) ml/min] was significantly lower than that in non-OC group [(0.78± 0.39) ml/min] (t=2.394, P=0.017). There was no statistical differences in other laboratory examinations between the two groups, including white blood cells (WBC), lymphocyte, platelet count, liver function, renal function, erythrocyte sedimentation rate, C-reactive protein, procalcitonin, immunoglobulin G, immunoglobulin M, immunoglobulin A, C3, C4 and so on. OC incidence in patients using prednisone≥15 mg/d [17.16% (133/775)] was higher than that in patients using prednisone<15 mg/d [12.53% (94/750)] and patients not using prednisone [14.84% (42/283)] (P<0.05). The incidence of OC in patients with immunosuppressant therapy [16.11% (226/1 403)] was statistically higher than that in non-immunosuppressant patients [10.62% (43/405)] (P<0.01). Logistic regression analysis showed that the risk factors of OC occurrence included primary diseases (P<0.001), age (P<0.001), duration of illness (P=0.001) and duration of hospitalization (P=0.002).@*Conclusions@#OC occurred commonly in rheumatism in-patients, especially in elder patients, patients with long duration of illness and hospital stay. OC incidence in CTD patients is significantly higher than that in non-CTD patients. Glucocorticoid and immunosuppressant therapy might significantly reduce the anti-fungal immunity of the patients.