Healio Rheumatology reports on HSS study results published in Arthritis Research & Therapy showing patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) who are on Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) have a 23% higher risk for cardiovascular disease (CVD) compared with those considered employable.

HSS rheumatologist Iris Navarro-Millan, MD, and colleagues conducted a retrospective, longitudinal analysis of data from 2006 through 2016. The analysis consisted of six cohorts, three of which used data from SSDI beneficiaries and three from patients enrolled in Marketscan, a health care research database. Patients in all cohorts were aged 40 to 65 years.

A total of 380,336 patients with RA, with an average age of 53 years, were included in the analysis. Overall, there was a higher rate of comorbidities among patients on SSDI, compared with those on commercial insurance, according to the researchers. In the second cohort, including patients receiving a disease-modifying antirheumatic drug (DMARD) for therapy, patients receiving SSDI demonstrated a higher risk for CVD (HR = 1.23; 95% CI, 1.14-1.33), compared with those on commercial insurance. There was no statistically significant difference in CVD risk in the third cohort.

Read the full article at Healio.com/news/rheumatology.