Less educated and older patients have reduced access to biologic DMARDs even in a country with highly developed social welfare (Norway): results from Norwegian cohort study NOR-DMARD.

Objective: To explore whether age, gender or education influence the time until initiation of the first bDMARD in patients with RA.

Methods: Data from the Norwegian Register of DMARDs collected between 2000 and 2012 were used. Only DMARD-naïve patients with RA starting their first conventional synthetic DMARD were included in the analyses.