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. 2017 Nov 15;19(1):251.
doi: 10.1186/s13075-017-1457-z.

Chinese Registry of rheumatoid arthritis (CREDIT): II. prevalence and risk factors of major comorbidities in Chinese patients with rheumatoid arthritis

Shangyi Jin  1 , Mengtao Li  2 , Yongfei Fang  3 , Qin Li  4 , Ju Liu  5 , Xinwang Duan  6 , Yi Liu  7 , Rui Wu  8 , Xiaofei Shi  9 , Yongfu Wang  10 , Zhenyu Jiang  11 , Yanhong Wang  12 , Chen Yu  1 , Qian Wang  1 , Xinping Tian  1 , Yan Zhao  1 , Xiaofeng Zeng  13 ; CREDIT Co-authors
Affiliations

Chinese Registry of rheumatoid arthritis (CREDIT): II. prevalence and risk factors of major comorbidities in Chinese patients with rheumatoid arthritis

Shangyi Jin et al. Arthritis Res Ther. .

Abstract

Background: Rheumatoid arthritis patients are at higher risk of developing comorbidities. The main objective of this study was to evaluate the prevalence of major comorbidities in Chinese rheumatoid arthritis patients. We also aimed to identify factors associated with these comorbidities.

Methods: Baseline demographic, clinical characteristics and comorbidity data from RA patients enrolled in the Chinese Registry of rhEumatoiD arthrITis (CREDIT) from Nov 2016 to August 2017 were presented and compared with those from five other registries across the world. Possible factors related to three major comorbidities (cardiovascular disease, fragility fracture and malignancy) were identified using multivariate logistic regression analyses.

Results: A total of 13,210 RA patients were included (80.6% female, mean age 52.9 years and median RA duration 4.0 years). Baseline prevalence rates of major comorbidities were calculated: CVD, 2.2% (95% CI 2.0-2.5%); fragility fracture, 1.7% (95% CI 1.5-1.9%); malignancy, 0.6% (95% CI 0.5-0.7%); overall major comorbidities, 4.2% (95% CI 3.9-4.6%). Advanced age was associated with all comorbidities. Male gender and disease duration were positively related to CVD. Female sex and longer disease duration were potential risk factors for fragility fractures. Ever use of methotrexate (MTX) was negatively related to baseline comorbidities.

Conclusions: Patients with rheumatoid arthritis in China have similar prevalence of comorbidities with other Asian countries. Advanced age and long disease duration are possible risk factors for comorbidities. On the contrary, MTX may protect RA patients from several major comorbidities, supporting its central role in the management of rheumatoid arthritis.

Keywords: Cardiovascular disease; Comorbidity; Fragility fracture; Malignancy; Methotrexate; Rheumatoid arthritis; Risk factor.

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Conflict of interest statement

Ethics approval and consent to participate

Informed consent was obtained from all patients at enrollment. Ethics approval for the registry was obtained from the Medical Ethics Committee of Peking Union Medical College Hospital (PUMCH), which was accepted by all participating centers as the central institutional review board (IRB).

Consent for publication

Not applicable.

Competing interests

The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Publisher’s Note

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

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