COVID-19 AMONG A SAMPLE OF IRAQI PATIENTS WITH RHEUMATIC DISEASES: A MULTICENTER STUDY

Background: There are scarce data on disease characteristics and severity of coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) among Iraqi patients with rheumatic diseases (RDs). In this study, we aimed to report the disease characteristics and variables associated with COVID-19 outcome among patients with RDs. Methods: Between October 2020 and April 2021, rheumatic diseases (RDs) patients with COVID-19 were registered from different centres in Iraq. The patient's demographics, rheumatological history, COVID-19 symptoms, severity, and management, if any, their disease progress and outcome have been assessed. Binary logistic regression analysis was performed to determine predictors of disease severity. Results: 253 patients were included in the study, and most were females. The commonest rheumatic disease was rheumatoid arthritis (RA), followed by systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) and ankylosing spondylitis (AS) (95, 52 and 20 patients respectively). It has been found that 50.6% of patients had mild COVID-19, and 49.4% had moderate disease;18% of patients required oxygen support, no patient was treated in hospital, and there was no reported death. Patients with moderate COVID-19 had significantly higher age than mild type (p= 0.022);with more BMI (p=0.03), more in the number of comorbidities (p<0.001), more steroids users (p=0.012), higher steroid dose (P=0.034), had longer steroid duration, longer duration of conventional disease-modifying antirheumatic drugs (cDMARDs) (p=0.018), and biologic Diseasemodifying Antirheumatic Drug (bDMARDs) in months (p=0.025). Increasing body mass index (BMI), duration of biological DMARDs use, and an increasing number of comorbidities were significant independent factors that increase the risk of having more severe COVID-19, (p<0.05). Conclusion: COVID-19 infection rheumatic patients tend to have mild-moderate disease course;BMI, duration of biological DMARDs use, and many comorbidities were significant independent factors that increase the risk of having more severe COVID-19,(p<0.05). © 2022, University of Defence, Faculty of Military Health Sciences. All rights reserved.