Prevalence of hypothyroidism in rheumatoid arthritis and its correlation with disease activity.

OBJECTIVES: To analyse the prevalence of hypothyroidism in rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients and to elucidate its correlation with disease activity. METHODS: A total of 52 RA patients were enrolled in this study. All patients were assessed fully clinically and underwent routine laboratory investigation including thyroid function testing. RESULTS: Hypothyroidism (defined as having a TSH level >4.20 µIU/mL) was observed in 20/52 (38.4%). Erythrocyte sedimentation rates (ESR) were found significantly elevated in patients with hypothyroidism compared to those without (36.3 ± 24.2 vs. 24.6 ± 9.0 mm/h). Disease activity parameters such as DAS-28-ESR, tender joint count; VAS scores were also significantly higher in the former. A significant correlation with serum TSH levels was observed with ESR and DAS-28-ESR. CONCLUSION: Thyroid function test should be included in clinical evaluation of RA patients.

Diabetic Kidney Disease and Hypertension: A True Love Story.

INTRODUCTION: Diabetes Mellitus (DM) remains one of the commonest causes of structural and functional kidney abnormalities leading to End Stage Renal Disease (ESRD). The next most common cause is hypertension. It is utmost important to investigate the association between diabetic nephropathy and hypertension because it is a major causal factor of end-stage kidney failure in Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus (T2DM). AIM: The aim of the present study was to investigate the association between albuminuria, hypertension and estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) in a prospective cohort of T2DM patients in a developing country. MATERIALS AND METHODS: A total of 824 patients were enrolled from a tertiary healthcare center in central India. This study was performed in three groups: normal controls (232), type 2 diabetics without nephropathy (185) and type 2 diabetics with nephropathy (407). Diabetic nephropathy was clinically defined by the presence of persistent proteinuria of > 500mg/day in a diabetic patient in the absence of clinical or laboratory evidence of other kidney or urinary tract disease. Hypertension was categorized based on JNC 7 classification. Detailed clinical history was obtained from all subjects. Student's t-test was applied to see the difference in mean values of quantitative data in two groups. Chi-Square test was applied to see the difference in frequency of discrete variables in two groups. RESULTS: A 66.3% diabetic nephropathy patients and 51.9% type 2 diabetics without nephropathy were found hypertensive in present study; In contrast only 14.7% controls had hypertension. No association of hypertension was found with age and gender in either group. Serum creatinine and eGFR was found significantly different in hypertensive diabetic nephropathy patients than normotensive (p=0.002 and <0.0001 respectively). CONCLUSION: Our study found that hypertension was an independent risk factor for the Diabetic Kidney Disease (DKD). Along with this, a proportional increase in the level of serum creatinine and eGFR was seen with an incidence of hypertension in diabetic nephropathy.