[Rheumatoid aortic insufficiencies: severity of the prognosis]

Rheumatoid aortic incompetence is infrequent, with only 43 cases published in the literature. Seven additional patients (5 females and 2 males) with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and aortic incompetence are reported herein. All seven patients had seropositive RA with severe joint disease and extraarticular manifestations (nodules, cutaneous vasculitis, multiple neuritis). Development of aortic incompetence was unrelated to age or duration of RA. The aortic disease was diagnosed upon the development of sudden heart failure (pulmonary edema) in three patients and during a routine evaluation in the other four. The course was extremely severe with a fatal outcome in five patients, of whom the youngest was only 24. Only one patient had valve replacement surgery; however, this patient died 8 days after the procedure. Mean survival in the seven patients was 20 months (range 7-56) from diagnosis and 11 months (range 1-28) from the first manifestation of heart failure. Histologic studies done in the only patient who had surgery demonstrated a rheumatoid granuloma in the pericardium and lymphocytic infiltrates in the pericardium and aortic valve.