Oral Immunosuppressive Treatment of Myasthenia Gravis in Denmark: A Nationwide Drug Utilization Study, 1996-2013.

Although immunosuppressants in the treatment of myasthenia have been available for several decades, population-based studies describing drug utilization in myasthenia patients are scarce. We aimed in this study to describe the treatment of myasthenia in Denmark in more recent years with emphasis on use of oral immunosuppressant agents. We identified a nationwide cohort of incident myasthenia patients in Denmark from 1996 to 2013 and tracked their use of drugs over the entire period using data from nationwide registers.

[Paraneoplastic myasthenia gravis and polymyositis secondary to a thymoma in a young woman].

We present the case of a 33-year-old woman who within weeks developed severe swallowing difficulties and weakness in her limbs to an extent requiring hospitalization. Workup confirmed clinically suspected diagnoses of polymyositis and autoimmune myasthenia. A suspicion of malignant thymoma based on chest computed tomography was histologically verified.

Identifying patients with myasthenia for epidemiological research by linkage of automated registers.

Background: We validated a new method of identifying patients with incident myasthenia in automated Danish registers for the purpose of conducting epidemiological studies of the disorder.

Methods: For residents of a Danish county (population 484,862) in 1993-2008, we identified any hospital contacts coded for myasthenia in a nationwide patient register and any prescriptions for pyridostigmine in the county prescription register. Results from an acetylcholine receptor antibody register were linked to the data.