BACKGROUND: Fatigue is a common complaint in rheumatoid arthritis patients and contributes to loss of quality of life. OBJECTIVE: To study the influence of hemoglobin levels and disease activity index upon fatigue in patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA). METHODS: We studied 130 RA patients for DAS 28, hemoglobin levels and fatigue as measured by FACIT F. RESULTS: No association between fatigue with hemoglobin levels was observed. A positive association with DAS-28 was found. Decomposing DAS-28, no association could be detected with sedimentation rate but a positive correlation with analogical scale for general health, number of swollen and painful joints was found. CONCLUSION: Although a positive association of fatigue with DAS-28 is found it appears that the most important items in connection with fatigue are swollen and tender joints as well as general health status. Hemoglobin levels were not related to fatigue in our patients.
BACKGROUND:Fatigue is a common complaint in rheumatoid arthritispatients and contributes to loss of quality of life. OBJECTIVE: To study the influence of hemoglobin levels and disease activity index upon fatigue in patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA). METHODS: We studied 130 RApatients for DAS 28, hemoglobin levels and fatigue as measured by FACIT F. RESULTS: No association between fatigue with hemoglobin levels was observed. A positive association with DAS-28 was found. Decomposing DAS-28, no association could be detected with sedimentation rate but a positive correlation with analogical scale for general health, number of swollen and painful joints was found. CONCLUSION: Although a positive association of fatigue with DAS-28 is found it appears that the most important items in connection with fatigue are swollen and tender joints as well as general health status. Hemoglobin levels were not related to fatigue in our patients.
Authors: Héctor Corominas; Cayetano Alegre; Javier Narváez; Carlos Marras Fernández-Cid; Vicenç Torrente-Segarra; Manuel Rodríguez Gómez; Francisco Maceiras Pan; Rosa María Morlà; Fernando José Rodríguez Martínez; Antoni Gómez-Centeno; Laura Losada Ares; Rocío González Molina; Silvia Paredes González-Albo; Joan Dalmau-Carolà; Carolina Pérez-García; Ceferino Barbazán Álvarez; Liliana Ercole; Maria Ángeles Terrancle Journal: Medicine (Baltimore) Date: 2019-06 Impact factor: 1.817