Quantification of reduced health-related quality of life in patients with rheumatoid arthritis compared to the general population.

OBJECTIVE: To compare levels of health-related quality of life (HRQOL) among patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) to those of the general population.

METHODS: Disease burden was assessed using a generic health status instrument (Medical Outcome Study Short Form-36) for measurements of HRQOL and SF-6D to calculate utility scores in representative patients aged 20 to 79 years from the Oslo RA Register (n = 1052), and in individuals in the general population (n = 2323). Comparisons were performed with respect to sex and age, and standardized difference scores (s-scores) were calculated for comparisons with the norm.

RESULTS: HRQOL in patients with RA was reduced compared to the general population on all scales of the SF-36 for both males and females and for all age groups. s-scores adjusted for age and education ranged from -1.39 for physical functioning to -0.27 for mental health. The overall difference in utility was 0.16 and ranged from 0.13 (in female patients below 50 yrs) to 0.20 (patients 50-60 years). This implies that RA of 1 year duration entails a disease burden of 14-20 quality-adjusted life-years in 100 RA patients.

CONCLUSION: RA inflicts a substantial disease burden, and the disease affects all HRQOL dimensions as measured by the SF-36 in both sexes and in all age groups. Physical functioning is predominantly affected, but RA has social and mental consequences.