Arthritis care & research
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Arthritis care & research · Oct 2014
Associations between pressure-pain threshold, symptoms, and radiographic knee and hip osteoarthritis.
To determine the association between generalized evoked pressure pain sensitivity with distal pressure-pain threshold (PPT) and the presence, severity, or number of involved knee/hip joints with radiographic osteoarthritis (rOA) or related symptoms. ⋯ PPT was significantly associated with self-reported single and multijoint symptoms. In contrast, after adjustment, PPT measured at the trapezius was not associated with asymptomatic knee or hip rOA. As such, PPT may prove to be a useful indicator of rOA pain processing and of why individuals respond favorably and others do not to treatments targeting rOA.
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Arthritis care & research · Oct 2014
Trends in prescription of opioids from 2003-2009 in persons with knee osteoarthritis.
Osteoarthritis (OA) of the knee is a painful condition affecting ∼13% of persons ages >65 years. We sought to examine whether the use of opioids in older persons with OA has increased over the past decade and what patient characteristics may correlate with their use. ⋯ As the prevalence and incidence of knee OA continues to increase, the public health impact of greater opioid use should be monitored carefully.
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Arthritis care & research · Oct 2014
Relationship between homocysteine levels and hypertension in systemic lupus erythematosus.
Homocysteine has been linked to atherosclerosis and hypertension (HT) in the general population. However, there is limited evidence regarding the effect of homocysteine on blood pressure and arterial stiffness in systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE). We examined whether homocysteine is associated with HT and arterial stiffness in women with SLE. ⋯ Homocysteine was independently associated with SBP and HT in women with SLE, but not in controls. Elevated homocysteine levels could increase the risk of HT in SLE.
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Arthritis care & research · Oct 2014
Polysymptomatic distress in patients with rheumatoid arthritis: understanding disproportionate response and its spectrum.
Fibromyalgia (FM) in rheumatoid arthritis (RA) can cause consternation because symptoms are seen to be out of proportion to physician and laboratory assessments, and composite RA activity scores such as the 28 joint Disease Activity Score, Clinical Disease Activity Index, and Routine Assessment of Patient Index Data 3 (RAPID-3) can yield apparently "wrong" results. We explored the effect of polysymptomatic distress (PSD), a measure of fibromyalgianess and a quantity derived from the American College of Rheumatology 2010 FM diagnostic criteria, to explain the relationship of patient to physician variables. ⋯ PSD rather than FM diagnosis more usefully identifies and predicts disproportionate responses. Just as there are patients who lean disproportionately toward greater severity, there are also patients who disproportionately report milder symptoms. Composite measures used to assess RA are flawed, as they confound RA inflammation and patient distress, and more consideration should be given to disaggregated assessments. PSD also appears to be influenced weakly by RA disease activity.