How Were the Elderly RA Patients Doing Over the Past Year?-A Post Hoc Analysis for Telephone Based Following Up to RA Patients in Zunyi China

Yong Chen; Yan-Juan Chen; Jian-Feng Luo; Mang He; Si-Jin Zhao; Shi-Dan Tian; Yong-Qiao Zhang; Xiao-Long Chen; Chuan-Jie Yang; Yu-Zhuo Luo; Kutty Selva Nandakumar; Mei Tian

doi:10.2147/JIR.S493145

How Were the Elderly RA Patients Doing Over the Past Year?-A Post Hoc Analysis for Telephone Based Following Up to RA Patients in Zunyi China

J Inflamm Res. 2024 Nov 18:17:8935-8944. doi: 10.2147/JIR.S493145. eCollection 2024.

Authors

Affiliations

¹ Department of Rheumatology and Immunology, Affiliated Hospital of Zunyi Medical University, Zunyi, People's Republic of China.
² Department of Biostatistics, School of Public Health, Fudan University, Shanghai, People's Republic of China.
³ The First School of Clinical Medicine, Zunyi Medical University, Zunyi, People's Republic of China.
⁴ Department of Medical Biochemistry and Biophysics, Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden.

Abstract

Purpose: The quality of life (QoL) of elderly patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) in Zunyi China based on health parameters has not been previously analyzed. This study compares the 36-Item Short Form Health Survey (SF-36) scores and prevailing health complications between <60y and ≥60y patients with RA. Data from 1166 patients with RA who visited the rheumatology department of Zunyi Medical University Hospital were followed up and retrospectively analyzed.

Patients and methods: Data from 1166 patients with RA who visited the rheumatology department of Zunyi Medical University Hospital (2021.1-2022.8) were followed up and retrospectively analyzed.

Results: Twenty cases passed away at 61.55 ± 8.11y, which was 6.75 years less than the local average age of death. Elderly patients with RA reported lower recovery levels, and their levels of inflammatory markers such as Immunoglobulin M-rheumatoid factor (IgM-RF), erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR), and C-reactive protein (CRP) levels were significantly higher than those of younger patients during their past one-year observation period. The SF-36 results indicated that eight items of QoL in the elderly patients were all significantly inferior to <60y patients, while the complications of interstitial lung disease (ILD), latent tuberculosis infection (LTBI) and, lung and herpes zoster infections were significantly higher.

Conclusion: Elderly patients had a higher disease activity along with poor QoL, more health-related complications, and susceptibility to infections. Our study emphasizes the imperative need for optimization of RA treatment modalities in the elderly to alleviate their sufferings.

Keywords: SF-36 scores; clinical characteristics; elderly rheumatoid arthritis; treatment outcomes.

Grants and funding

This work was supported by the Doctoral Research Start-up Fund Project in the affiliated Hospital of Zunyi Medical University (No. YZ-2023-03), and Science and Technology Fund project of Guizhou Provincial Health Commission (gzwkj2024-126).