VIDEO: Common comorbid conditions associated with rheumatoid arthritis

Editor’s note: This is an automatically generated transcript, which has been slightly edited for clarity. Please notify editor@healio.com if there are concerns regarding accuracy of the transcription.

Rheumatoid arthritis is associated with a number of comorbid conditions. In fact, people with RA tend to develop increasing numbers of comorbid conditions over their lifetimes at a pace that outpaces people that don't have rheumatoid arthritis. Some of those things can include metabolic diseases like diabetes as well as cardiovascular disease in particular. Unfortunately, it's difficult to predict in patients with rheumatoid arthritis who is likely to experience cardiovascular events, so that's something that's really important. There are also things that lung disease that are common in patients with RA, people that are rheumatoid arthritis associated with smoking frequently, so patients can have smoking related lung disease, but also lung disease related to the rheumatoid arthritis. There are certainly other comorbid conditions that follow with rheumatoid arthritis, but those are some of the most common one and that I'm interested in is functional limitations and muscle loss. So, muscle function can be reduced in patients with rheumatoid arthritis and is often overlooked and it's something that we can sort of intervene on if we notice it and we can get people better enough so that they can exercise and work those muscles out. One of the unmet needs perhaps, of rheumatoid arthritis is sort of preventing it before it develops and causes more difficulty, either treating the disease itself or just reduces long-term outcomes that are important for patients with arthritis.