ABSTRACT
INTRODUCTION: We assessed the risk factors and outcome of COVID-19 in patients with autoimmune rheumatic diseases(AIRD) who contracted infection while on background treatment with tofacitinib. METHODS: This is a non-interventional, cross-sectional, questionnaire based telephonic study which included consecutive AIRD patients on tofacitinib co-treatment. Data related to the AIRD subset, disease modifying anti rheumatic drugs(DMARDs) including glucocorticoids and comorbidities, was collected from 7 rheumatology centers across Karnataka during the second wave of COVID-19 pandemic. The information about COVID-19 occurrence and COVID-19 vaccination was recorded. RESULTS: During the study period (Jun-July 2021), 335 AIRD patients (80.6% female) on treatment with tofacitinib were included. The mean duration of tofacitinib use was 3.4+/-3.1months. Thirty-six(10.75%) patients developed COVID-19. Diabetes mellitus (p = 0.04 (OR 2.60 (1.13-5.99)) was identified as a risk factor for COVID-19 in our cohort. Almost half of our cohort was COVID-19 vaccinated with at least one dose, with resultant decline in incidence of COVID-19(OR 0.15 (0.06-0.39) among the vaccinated. Recovery amongst COVID-19 infection group was 91.2%. CONCLUSIONS: The subset of AIRD patients who were on treatment with tofacitinib were found to have a higher rate of COVID-19 infection as compared to our KRACC cohort. Pre-existing comorbidity of diabetes mellitus was the significant risk factor in our cohort. This subset of the KRACC cohort shows RA patients had a lesser infection and PsA patients had a higher infection.
ABSTRACT
The aim was to study the prevalence of comorbidities in rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients in everyday clinical practice and their association with disease-specific and demographic factors. The multi-center study recruited 3,247 (at 14 centers, and 265) were excluded due to incomplete data. The number of subjects considered for the analysis was 2982. The mean (±standard deviation) age was 48.98±12.64 years and the male-to-female ratio was 1:5. The data was collected based on a pre-structured pro forma by trained clinical research associates through interview and verification of charts and reports available in the patient records. The following comorbidities were studied: cardiovascular disease, hypertension, diabetes mellitus, hypercholesterolemia, thyroid disease, psychiatric diseases like depression, and pulmonary disease. Hypertension (20.7%), diabetes mellitus (14.4%) and thyroid disease (18.3%) were the most prevalent comorbidities. Hypercholesterolemia (5.3%), pulmonary diseases (2.1%), cardiovascular diseases (0.2%) and depression (0.03%) were prevalent in ≤5% of the study population. The overall presence of comorbidity increased with age and reduced with the duration of illness prior (DOIP). The age, gender, and DOIP differed significantly between groups with and without hypercholesterolemia. Females had a statistically increased prevalence of thyroid disease. The prevalence of comorbidities in RA patients from south India is around 40% and the incidence of comorbidity increased with age. As per the literature evidence, the prevalence in the current study subjects was higher when compared to prevalence of similar diseases occurring in the general south Indian population.
