Press Release Details

View all news

Rheumatoid Arthritis Linked to a Lower Risk of Type 2 Diabetes

08/05/2020

A recent analysis of a US commercial insurance database found that adults with rheumatoid arthritis had a lower risk of developing type 2 diabetes than other individuals, including those with other types of arthritis.

The analysis, which is published in Arthritis Care & Research, compared adults with rheumatoid arthritis with four other groups: individuals from the general population without rheumatoid arthritis, individuals with hypertension, individuals with osteoarthritis, and individuals with psoriatic arthritis. A total of 449,327 people were included.

During the median of 1.6 years of follow-up, the rate of type 2 diabetes development was lowest in the rheumatoid arthritis group (7.0 per 1,000 people per year) and highest (12.3 per 1,000 people per year) in the hypertension group. After adjustments, rheumatoid arthritis was associated with a 24% to 35% lower risk of developing type 2 diabetes compared with the four other groups.

“While systemic inflammation in rheumatoid arthritis increases the risk of cardiovascular disease, our findings unexpectedly show that having rheumatoid arthritis itself does not confer an increased risk of type 2 diabetes compared with four different comparator groups,” said senior author Seoyoung C. Kim, MD, ScD, MSCE, of Harvard Medical School. “Since all rheumatoid arthritis patients included in our study were treated with at least one disease-modifying antirheumatic drug, our study is unable to test the association between no treatment or undertreatment for rheumatoid arthritis and risk of type 2 diabetes.”  

Additional Information

Link to Study: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/acr.24343

About Journal 

Arthritis Care & Research, an official journal of the American College of Rheumatology and the Association of Rheumatology Health Professionals (a division of the College), is a peer-reviewed publication that publishes original research, review articles, and editorials that promote excellence in the clinical practice of rheumatology. Relevant to the care of individuals with rheumatic diseases, major topics are evidence-based practice studies, clinical problems, practice guidelines, educational, social, and public health issues, health economics, health care policy, and future trends in rheumatology practice.

About Wiley

Wiley drives the world forward with research and education. Through publishing, platforms and services, we help students, researchers, universities, and corporations to achieve their goals in an ever-changing world. For more than 200 years, we have delivered consistent performance to all of our stakeholders. The Company's website can be accessed at www.wiley.com.

Multimedia Files:

View all news