The 5-HT1A receptor agonist buspirone improves esophageal motor function and symptoms in systemic sclerosis: a 4-week, open-label trial

Table 1 Demographic characteristics, disease characteristics, symptoms, and manometry in the study population (n = 22)

Variable	Value
Age (years)	52. 5 ± 11.9
Sex (female/male)	19/3
Duration of disease (years)^a	8.7 ± 6.7
Diffuse SSc (n (%))	16 (72.7)
Pulmonary fibrosis^b	15 (68.1)
Digital ulcers^c	10 (45.5)
Anti-Scl 70 (%)	9 (41 %)
ANA (%)	19 (86.4 %)
ACA (%)	2 (9.1 %)
CPK (> × 2 normal values) (%)	2 (9.1 %)^d
Supra-aortic coronal diameters (cm)	12.4 ± 5.3
Infra-aortic coronal diameters (cm)	22.5 ± 11.1
Frequency of symptoms (%)
-dysphagia	12 (54.5)
-heartburn	20 (91.0)
-regurgitation	19 (86.0)
-chest pain	8 (36.4)
severity of symptoms (0–100)
-dysphagia	25.8 ± 30.7
-heartburn	27.1 ± 24.0
-regurgitation	39.3 ± 29.8
-chest pain	10.4 ± 2.1
amplitude of distal contractions (mmHg)	16.6 ± 9.6
duration of distal contractions (cm)	3.7 ± 2.4
velocity of distal contractions (cm/sec)	2.6 ± 1.9
LES resting pressure (mmHg)	7.7 ± 3.9
LES residual pressure (mmHg)	2.9 ± 1.9
IRP (mmHg)	3.1 ± 2.3

SSc systemic sclerosis, ANA antinuclear antibody, ACA anti-centromere antibody, LES lower esophageal sphincter, IRP integrated relaxation pressure, HRCT, High resolution computed tomography, CPK, creatinophosphokinase, anti-Scl, anti-topoisomerase I
^aDisease duration was from first non-Raunaud’s symptom
^bPresence of interstitial lung disease was determined after evaluation of HRCT
^cFive out of these ten patients had active digital ulcers at the time of the manometry
^dNone of the patients had clinical signs of myositis or skeletal myopathy

ISSN: 1478-6362