Cardiovascular mortality and cardiovascular event rates in patients with inflammatory rheumatic diseases in the CARdiovascular in rheuMAtology (CARMA) prospective study-results at 5 years of follow-up.

Objectives: To determine cardiovascular (CV) mortality and incidence of the first CV event (CVE) in patients with chronic inflammatory rheumatic diseases (CIRD) after 5 years of follow-up.

Methods: This is an analysis of the CARdiovascular in rheMAatology (CARMA) study after 5 years of follow-up. It includes patients with RA (n = 775), AS (n = 738) and PsA (n = 721), and individuals without CIRD (n = 677) attending outpatient rheumatology clinics from 67 public hospitals in Spain.

Pure Membranous Lupus Nephritis: Description of a Cohort of 150 Patients and Review of the Literature.

Objectives: The course and long-term outcome of pure membranous lupus nephritis (MLN) are little understood. The aims of this study are to evaluate the clinical features, course, outcome and prognostic indicators in pure MLN and to determine the impact of ethnicity and the type of health insurance on the course and prognosis of pure MLN.

Methods: We conducted a retrospective review of medical records of 150 patients with pure MLN from Spain and the USA.

Baseline comorbidities in patients with rheumatoid arthritis who have been prescribed biological therapy: a case control study.

Aim: To determine whether rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients who have been prescribed biological agents exhibit a different comorbidity burden than RA patients who take disease-modifying antirheumatic drugs (DMARDs) alone, and to understand the association between comorbidity and other variables, as well as the association between comorbidity and multimorbidity.

Methods: This observational case-control study included 114 RA patients treated with biological agents and a control group comprising 163 sex- and age-matched RA patients treated with DMARDs only. Current and previous data regarding the patients' disease activity, comorbidities, and treatments were collected.

Effectiveness, predictive response factors, and safety of anti-tumor necrosis factor (TNF) therapies in anti-TNF-naive rheumatoid arthritis.

Objective: To evaluate the effectiveness and safety of anti-tumor necrosis factor (anti-TNF) therapies in rheumatoid arthritis (RA), and to identify the factors involved in this response.

Methods: Dynamic prospective cohort study of patients with RA treated with anti-TNF under clinical practice conditions. Effectiveness was evaluated using Disease Activity Score (DAS) 28, European League Against Rheumatism (EULAR) response, Health Assessment Questionnaire (HAQ), and time to treatment failure.