IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jijerp/v20y2023i3p2123-d1045646.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Herpes Zoster Risk in Patients with Rheumatoid Arthritis and Its Association with Medications Used

Author

Listed:
  • Sithembiso Tiyandza Dlamini

    (Graduate Institute of Medicine, College of Medicine, Kaohsiung Medical University, Kaohsiung 807378, Taiwan)

  • Kyaw Moe Htet

    (Graduate Institute of Medicine, College of Medicine, Kaohsiung Medical University, Kaohsiung 807378, Taiwan)

  • Ei Chue Chue Theint

    (Graduate Institute of Medicine, College of Medicine, Kaohsiung Medical University, Kaohsiung 807378, Taiwan)

  • Aerrosa Murenda Mayadilanuari

    (M. Sc. Program in Tropical Medicine, College of Medicine, Kaohsiung Medical University, Kaohsiung 807378, Taiwan)

  • Wei-Ming Li

    (Department of Urology, Kaohsiung Medical University Hospital, Kaohsiung 807378, Taiwan
    Department of Urology, School of Medicine, College of Medicine, Kaohsiung Medical University, Kaohsiung 807378, Taiwan
    Department of Urology, Ministry of Health and Welfare, Pingtung Hospital, Pingtung 90054, Taiwan)

  • Yi-Ching Tung

    (Department of Public Health and Environmental Medicine, School of Medicine, College of Medicine, Kaohsiung Medical University, Kaohsiung 807378, Taiwan
    These authors contributed equally to this work.)

  • Hung-Pin Tu

    (Department of Public Health and Environmental Medicine, School of Medicine, College of Medicine, Kaohsiung Medical University, Kaohsiung 807378, Taiwan
    Department of Medical Research, Kaohsiung Medical University Hospital, Kaohsiung 807378, Taiwan
    These authors contributed equally to this work.)

Abstract

Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) was associated with the risk of incident herpes zoster (HZ), which might be influenced by medication use by RA patients. We aimed to investigate the association of RA with the risk of incident HZ and how the HZ risk effected by RA medications in CIC RA patients. We conducted an observational study including population-based representative insurance claims data of 19,673 patients with RA and 39,346 matched patients without RA during 1997–2010 from the Taiwan National Health Insurance Research Database; we identified 1651 patients with catastrophic illness-certified (CIC) RA and 11,557 matched patients with non-CIC RA. Exploratory analyses assessed the association between RA/CIC RA and risk of incident HZ and its complications. The association of prescribed medications with HZ risk in CIC RA patients was also estimated. The incidence rates of HZ were higher in CIC RA patients and non-CIC RA than in the matched people without RA (21.95 and 14.03 vs. 7.36 events per 1000 person-years, respectively). The adjusted incidence rate ratio (95% confidence interval (CI)) for HZ was 1.74 (1.65–1.84) in RA patients vs. matched non-RA and 1.65 (1.44–1.89) in CIC RA patients vs. non-CIC RA. For HZ complications, RA had a 2.85-fold higher risk than non-RA, and CIC RA had a 1.78-fold higher risk than non-CIC RA. Moreover, in CIC RA patients, prednisolone use was associated with incident HZ risk compared with prednisolone nonuse (adjusted odds ratio 1.48, 1.08–2.03); prolonged prednisolone use (approximately 5 years) increased the risk (adjusted odds ratio 2.16, 1.46–3.19). Our results suggested that RA was positively associated with HZ risk, particularly in RA patients with prednisolone use.

Suggested Citation

  • Sithembiso Tiyandza Dlamini & Kyaw Moe Htet & Ei Chue Chue Theint & Aerrosa Murenda Mayadilanuari & Wei-Ming Li & Yi-Ching Tung & Hung-Pin Tu, 2023. "Herpes Zoster Risk in Patients with Rheumatoid Arthritis and Its Association with Medications Used," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 20(3), pages 1-16, January.
  • Handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:20:y:2023:i:3:p:2123-:d:1045646
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/20/3/2123/pdf
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/20/3/2123/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:20:y:2023:i:3:p:2123-:d:1045646. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.