Neuropathologic evaluation of cerebrovascular disease in patients with rheumatoid arthritis

Active RA has been associated with an increased risk of both cardiovascular and peripheral vascular disease. We aimed to compare cerebrovascular changes in patients with and without RA, both with and without a neuropathologic diagnosis of neurodegenerative disease.

Patients with RA (n = 32) who died and underwent autopsy between 1994 and 2021 were matched to non-RA controls (n = 32) on age, sex and level of neurodegenerative proteinopathy. Routine neuropathologic examination was performed at the time of autopsy. Cerebrovascular disease severity was evaluated using modified Kalaria and Strozyk scales. Clinical dementia diagnoses were manually collected from patients' medical records.

Prior to death, 15 (47%) RA patients and 14 (44%) controls were diagnosed with dementia; 9 patients in each group (60% and 64%, respectively) had Alzheimer's disease. The prevalence of cerebral amyloid angiopathy, microinfarcts, infarcts or strokes was found to be similar between groups. Patients with RA were more likely to have more severe vascular changes in the basal ganglia by Kalaria scale (P = 0.04), but not in other brain areas. There were no significant differences in the presence of large infarcts, lacunar infarcts or leukoencephalopathy by Strozyk scale. Among patients with RA and no clinical diagnosis of dementia, the majority had mild-moderate cerebrovascular abnormalities, and a subset of patients had Alzheimer's disease neuropathologic changes.

In this small series of autopsies, patients with and without RA had largely similar cerebrovascular pathology when controlling for neurodegenerative proteinopathies, although patients with RA exhibited more pronounced cerebrovascular disease in the basal ganglia.