{"doi":"10.1002/acr2.11239","title":"Social Distancing, Health Care Disruptions, Telemedicine Use, and Treatment Interruption During the COVID‐19 Pandemic in Patients With or Without Autoimmune Rheumatic Disease","abstract":"BACKGROUND: We aimed to compare concerns, social distancing, health care disruptions, and telemedicine use in patients with autoimmune rheumatic disease (ARD) and non-ARD and to evaluate factors associated with immunomodulatory medication interruptions. METHODS: Patients in a multistate community rheumatology practice network completed surveys from April 2020 to May 2020. Adults with common ARD (rheumatoid arthritis, spondyloarthritis, systemic lupus erythematosus) or non-ARD (gout, osteoarthritis, osteoporosis) were evaluated. Concerns about coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), social distancing, health care disruptions, and telemedicine use were compared in patients with ARD versus non-ARD, adjusting for demographics, rural residence, and zipcode-based measures of socioeconomic status and COVID-19 activity. Factors associated with medication interruptions were assessed in patients with ARD. RESULTS: Surveys were completed by 2319/36 193 (6.4%) patients with non-ARD and 6885/64 303 (10.7%) with ARD. Concerns about COVID-19 and social distancing behaviors were similar in both groups, although patients receiving a biologic or Janus kinase (JAK) inhibitor reported greater concerns and were more likely to avoid friends/family, stores, or leaving the house. Patients with ARD were less likely to avoid office visits (45.2% vs. 51.0%, odds ratio [OR] 0.79 [0.70-0.89]) with similar telemedicine use. Immunomodulatory medications were stopped in 9.7% of patients with ARD, usually (86.9%) without a physician recommendation. Compared with patients with an office visit, the likelihood of stopping medication was higher for patients with a telemedicine visit (OR 1.54 [1.19-1.99]) but highest for patients with no visits (OR 2.26 [1.79-2.86]). CONCLUSION: Patients with ARD and non-ARD reported similar concerns about COVID-19 and similar social distancing behaviors. Missed office visits were strongly associated with interruptions in immunomodulatory medication.","journal":"ACR Open Rheumatology","year":2021,"id":168564,"datarank":1.2683252977717876,"base_score":3.4339872044851463,"endowment":3.4339872044851463,"self_citation_contribution":0.515098080672772,"citation_network_contribution":0.7532272170990155,"self_endowment_contribution":0.515098080672772,"citer_contribution":0.7532272170990155,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":30,"citer_count":20,"citers_with_citation_signal":16,"citers_with_endowment":16,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.8364,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2021-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":305808,"name":"Joshua F. Baker","orcid":"0000-0003-0799-7563","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":305807,"name":"Shubhasree Banerjee","orcid":"0000-0003-0903-1949","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":698673,"name":"Howard Busch","orcid":null,"position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":305810,"name":"David Curtis","orcid":"0000-0002-8005-912X","position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":246150,"name":"Maria I. Danila","orcid":"0000-0001-9246-6200","position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":305809,"name":"Kelly Gavigan","orcid":"0000-0003-2615-4940","position":6,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":697997,"name":"Daniel Kirby","orcid":"0000-0002-0878-2620","position":7,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":5969,"name":"Peter A. Merkel","orcid":"0000-0001-9284-7345","position":8,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":698674,"name":"George Munoz","orcid":null,"position":9,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":305812,"name":"W. Benjamin Nowell","orcid":"0000-0002-4951-6476","position":10,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":698675,"name":"Stewart Patrick","orcid":null,"position":11,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":698676,"name":"William Sunshine","orcid":null,"position":12,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":305806,"name":"Shilpa Venkatachalam","orcid":"0000-0003-3889-9034","position":13,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":314416,"name":"Fenglong Xie","orcid":"0000-0002-7365-4801","position":14,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":305811,"name":"Jeffrey R. Curtis","orcid":"0000-0002-8907-8976","position":15,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":305805,"name":"Michael George","orcid":"0000-0002-0398-2308","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":24,"raw_metadata":{"citation_network_status":"fetched"},"created_at":"2026-07-18T23:46:06.853307Z","pmid":"33934576","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}