Arterial hypertension assessed “out-of-office” in a contemporary cohort of rheumatoid arthritis patients free of cardiovascular disease is characterized by high prevalence, low awareness, poor control and increased vascular damage-associated “white coat” phenomenon

Table 2 Demographics of the 214 patients with rheumatoid arthritis and the 1:1 age- and gender-matched control group ^a

Characteristics	RA	Control group	P
Hypercholesterolemia (%)	42	28	0.176
Diabetes mellitus (%)	6	13	0.462
Current smokers (%)	30	42	0.089
Women in menopause (%)^b	77	61	<0.001
Body mass index (kg/m²)	27.1 ± 5.4	25.6 ± 6.4	0.430
Total cholesterol (mg/dl)	205.6 ± 36.9	199.8 ± 40.6	0.450
Glucose (mg/dl)	93.0 ± 19.0	94.7 ± 31.10	0.419
Creatinine (mg/dl)	0.8 ± 0.2	n/a
eCCL (ml/min)	96.0 ± 33.4	-
C-reactive protein (mg/dl)	4.5 (2.2 to 11.4)	1.0 (0 to 3)	<0.001
Use of antihypertensive drugs (%)	44	34^c	–
RA-related drugs (%)
Corticosteroid (%)	70	–
Methotrexate (%)	58	–
Leflunomide (%)	17	–
Cyclosporin (%)	1	–
Nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (%)	5	–
Biologic drugs (%)	35	–
Hydroxychloroquine (%)	5	–

^aeCCL, estimated creatinine clearance using the Cockcroft-Gault formula; RA, rheumatoid arthritis. The RA patients had a mean age of 58.4 ± 12.3 years, and 82% were females. The study patients were age- and gender-matched 1:1 with a control group from the ATTICA study. Data are presented as means ± SD or medians (interquartile range) and analyzed by paired t-test, χ² test and Wilcoxon test as appropriate. ^bData were available for 170 of 176 female RA subjects and 132 of 176 controls. ^cData are derived from a previously published paper[35].

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