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Cardiovascular risk management in rheumatoid arthritis: are we still waiting for the first step?

Mike J L Peters, Michael T Nurmohamed

    Arthritis Research & Therapy
    |March 22, 2013
    PubMed

    Insights

    Cardiovascular risk management in rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is crucial but often overlooked. Rheumatologists identify and manage fewer cardiovascular risk factors (CRFs) in RA patients compared to primary care physicians (PCPs).

    Area of Science:

    • Rheumatology
    • Cardiology
    • Primary Care Medicine

    Background:

    • Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) carries a cardiovascular risk comparable to diabetes, necessitating robust cardiovascular risk management (CV-RM).
    • The actual implementation of CV-RM, including identification and treatment of cardiovascular risk factors (CRFs), in daily clinical practice for RA patients remains unclear.

    Discussion:

    • A retrospective cohort study compared CV-RM practices between rheumatologists and primary care physicians (PCPs).
    • Findings indicate that rheumatologists identified and managed CRFs in RA patients less frequently than PCPs.
    • PCPs also assessed CRFs less often in RA patients compared to their diabetic patients.

    Key Insights:

    • There is a significant gap in the identification and management of cardiovascular risk factors in rheumatoid arthritis patients.
    • Rheumatologists appear to underperform in CV-RM compared to PCPs for RA patients.
    • PCPs' attention to CRFs is lower in RA than in diabetes, highlighting a broader issue.

    Outlook:

    • There is a clear and urgent need to enhance CV-RM strategies for individuals with RA.
    • Improved CV-RM in RA requires a collaborative approach between rheumatologists and PCPs.
    • Future research should focus on implementing and evaluating interventions to optimize CV-RM in RA care.

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