• Fatos Onen, Dilek Solmaz, Pinar Cetin, Ismail Sari, Ali Balci, Merih Birlik, Servet Akar, and Nurullah Akkoc.
• From the Dokuz Eylul University School of Medicine, Division of Rheumatology, and Department of Radiodiagnostic, Izmir, Turkey.F. Onen, MD, Professor; D. Solmaz, MD, Assistant Professor; P. Cetin, MD, Specialist; I. Sari, MD, Associate Professor, Dokuz Eylul University School of Medicine, Division of Rheumatology; A. Balci, MD, Associate Professor, Dokuz Eylul University School of Medicine, Department of Radiodiagnostic; M. Birlik, MD, Associate Professor; S. Akar, MD, Professor; N. Akkoc, MD, Professor, Dokuz Eylul University School of Medicine, Division of Rheumatology. fatos.onen@deu.edu.tr.
• J Rheumatol. 2015 Sep 1; 42 (9): 1647-51.

ObjectiveTo estimate the prevalence of inflammatory back pain (IBP) and axial spondyloarthritis (axSpA) using the Assessment of SpondyloArthritis International Society (ASAS) classification criteria among employees in a university.MethodsIn the first stage of the study, a face-to-face interview was done using a standard questionnaire to investigate IBP in 381 subjects randomly selected from 2894 employees at Dokuz Eylul University in Izmir, Turkey. In the second stage, subjects with back pain for ≥ 3 months and age at onset < 45 years were evaluated for axSpA using the ASAS criteria. Both the European Spondyloarthropathy Study Group (ESSG) criteria and Amor criteria were used for the classification of the whole group of spondyloarthritis (SpA).ResultsThere were 131 male and 250 female subjects (mean age: 38.0 yrs). Twenty-five subjects (6.6%) were classified as having IBP according to the ASAS criteria. The prevalence of IBP according to the Berlin and Calin criteria was 7.1% and 21.5%, respectively. The prevalence of axSpA was estimated at 1.3% according to the ASAS classification criteria (0.5% for radiographic axSpA and 0.8% for nonradiographic axSpA). A total of 7 patients (1.8%) fulfilled both the Amor and ESSG criteria for the whole group of SpA.ConclusionThis is the first prevalence study of IBP and axSpA using ASAS classification criteria in the Turkish population. The prevalence estimates of IBP and axSpA reported here are within the upper range of other studies in European countries and the United States.

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