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High incidence of cardiovascular events in patients with rheumatoid arthritis
  1. K S S Steen1,
  2. W F Lems1,2,
  3. I M Visman2,
  4. M Heierman2,
  5. B A C Dijkmans1,2,
  6. J W R Twisk3,4,
  7. M Boers3,
  8. M T Nurmohamed1,2,5
  1. 1
    Department of Rheumatology, VU Medical Center, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
  2. 2
    Department of Rheumatology, Jan van Breemen Institute, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
  3. 3
    Department of Clinical Epidemiology and Biostatistics, VU Medical Center, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
  4. 4
    Institute of Health Sciences, VU Medical Center, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
  5. 5
    Department of Internal Medicine, VU Medical Center, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
  1. Correspondence to M T Nurmohamed, Department of Rheumatology, VU Medical Center, Boelelaan 1117, 1081 HV, Amsterdam, The Netherlands; mt.nurmohamed{at}vumc.nl

https://doi.org/10.1136/ard.2008.105023

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    Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is associated with higher risk for cardiovascular disease (CVD) in comparison with the general population.1 Traditional cardiovascular (CV) risk factors only partially explain the higher risk for CVD.2 There is increasing evidence that inflammation explains the enhanced CV risk in RA, as inflammation has a pivotal role in the development of atherosclerotic disease and this might be the link between increased atherosclerotic CVD and RA.3 Other RA-related factors might be undertreatment of CV comorbidity,1 and the use of non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) or selective cyclo-oxygenase 2 inhibitors.4,5

    The objective of this prospective observational study was to determine the incidence of CV events in patients with RA in comparison to the general Dutch population, where the incidence of CV events is …

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    Footnotes

    • Funding This study was facilitated by the Jan van Breemen Institute Clinical Research Bureau that receives financial support of the Dutch Arthritis Foundation, and was financially supported by an unrestricted grant from AstraZeneca.

    • Competing interests None declared.

    • Ethics approval The VU University Medical Center and Jan van Breemen Institute gave ethical approval for this study.