RESUMEN
OBJECTIVES: Glucocorticoids (GC) are widely accepted as the standard first-line treatment for giant cell arteritis (GCA). However, relapse rates are reported up to 80% on GC-only protocol arms in controlled trials of tocilizumab and abatacept in 12-24 months. Herein, we aimed to assess the real-life relapse rates retrospectively in patients with GCA from Turkey. METHODS: We assembled a retrospective cohort of patients with GCA diagnosed according to ACR 1990 criteria from tertiary rheumatology centres in Turkey. All clinical data were abstracted from medical records. Relapse was defined as any new manifestation or increased acutephase response leading to the change of the GC dose or use of a new therapeutic agent by the treating physician. RESULTS: The study included 330 (F/M: 196/134) patients with GCA. The mean age at disease onset was 68.9±9 years. The most frequent symptom was headache. Polymyalgia rheumatica was also present in 81 (24.5%) patients. Elevation of acute phase reactants (ESR>50 mm/h or CRP>5 mg/l) was absent in 25 (7.6%) patients at diagnosis. Temporal artery biopsy was available in 241 (73%) patients, and 180 of them had positive histopathological findings for GCA. For remission induction, GC pulses (250-1000 methylprednisolone mg/3-7 days) were given to 69 (20.9%) patients, with further 0.5-1 mg/kg/day prednisolone continued in the whole group. Immunosuppressives as GC-sparing agents were used in 252 (76.4%) patients. During a follow-up of a median 26.5 (6-190) months, relapses occurred in 49 (18.8%) patients. No confounding factor was observed in relapse rates. GC treatment could be stopped in only 62 (23.8%) patients. Additionally, GC-related side effects developed in 64 (24.6%) patients, and 141 (66.2%) had at least one Vasculitis Damage Index (VDI) damage item present during follow-up. CONCLUSIONS: In this first multi-centre series of GCA from Turkey, we observed that only one-fifth of patients had relapses during a mean follow-up of 26 months, with 76.4% given a GC-sparing IS agent at diagnosis. At the end of follow-up, GC-related side effects developed in one-fourth of patients. Our results suggest that patients with GCA had a low relapse rate in real-life experience of a multi-centre retrospective Turkish registry, however with a significant presence of GC-associated side effects during follow-up.
RESUMEN
We wanted to see how close we could get to our goal of treating rheumatoid arthritis (RA) without the use of glucocorticoids (GCs) in the disease-modifying antirheumatic drugs (DMARDs) era using real-life data. Established in 2017, the TReasure database is a web-based, prospective, observational cohort for Turkey. As of May 2019, there were 2,690 RA patients recorded as receiving biologic and targeted synthetic DMARDs (bDMARDs and tsDMARDs) therapy. At the start of the bDMARDs or tsDMARDs, patients with follow-up visits of at least 3 months were registered. At the time of registration and the last visit, doses of GCs were recorded and it was determined if the target dose of ≤ 7.5 mg was achieved. During registration and follow-up, 23.4% of the patients did not receive GCs and 76.5% of the patients received GCs at any time. GCs could be stopped after 59 (25-116) months in 28.4% of these patients, but 71.6% of patients were still using GC. The target GC dose could not be achieved in 18.2% of these patients (n = 352). The rate of continuing to use GC was significantly higher in women, in the elderly, those with rheumatoid factor (RF) positive, with higher Visual Analog Scale (VAS) pain and Disease Activity Score (DAS)-28. The initial GC dose of ≥ 7.5 mg/day was found to be crucial in not reaching the GC target dose (p < 0.001, OR 39.0 (24.1-63.2)). The initial GC dose of ≥ 7.5 mg/day, female gender, age, RF positivity, high DAS28, and VAS pain level were all highly related for GC continuation. Despite the use of DMARDs, our data revealed that we are still far from achieving our goal of treating RA without using steroids.