{"doi":"10.3899/jrheum.201017","title":"Concerns, Healthcare Use, and Treatment Interruptions in Patients With Common Autoimmune Rheumatic Diseases During the COVID-19 Pandemic","abstract":"OBJECTIVE: To assess concerns and healthcare-related behaviors of patients with autoimmune rheumatic diseases during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. METHODS: Adults from the United States with rheumatoid arthritis (RA), psoriatic arthritis (PsA), ankylosing spondylitis (AS), and systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) from the ArthritisPower Patient-Powered Research Network and CreakyJoints patient community completed surveys. Concerns and behaviors were compared among patients with different autoimmune conditions, disease-modifying antirheumatic drug (DMARD) use, and geographic measures of urban status, income, education, and COVID-19 activity. RESULTS: < 0.001). Avoidance of doctor's office visits (56.6%) or laboratory testing (42.3%) and use of telehealth (29.5%) were more common in urban areas. Among participants receiving a DMARD without COVID-19 or other respiratory illness, 14.9% stopped a DMARD, with 78.7% of DMARD interruptions not recommended by a physician. DMARD stopping was more common in participants with lower socioeconomic status (SES) and in participants who avoided an office visit (OR 1.46, 95% CI 1.04-2.04) or reported lack of telehealth availability OR 2.26 (95% CI 1.25-4.08). CONCLUSION: In the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic, patients with RA, PsA, AS, and SLE frequently avoided office visits and laboratory testing. DMARD interruptions commonly occurred without the advice of a physician and were associated with SES, office visits, and telehealth availability, highlighting the need for adequate healthcare access and attention to vulnerable populations during the pandemic.","journal":"The Journal of Rheumatology","year":2020,"id":58399,"datarank":0.0,"base_score":0.0,"endowment":0.0,"self_citation_contribution":0.0,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.0,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":73,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.8639,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2020-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":305806,"name":"Shilpa Venkatachalam","orcid":"0000-0003-3889-9034","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":305807,"name":"Shubhasree Banerjee","orcid":"0000-0003-0903-1949","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":305808,"name":"Joshua F. Baker","orcid":"0000-0003-0799-7563","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":5969,"name":"Peter A. Merkel","orcid":"0000-0001-9284-7345","position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":305809,"name":"Kelly Gavigan","orcid":"0000-0003-2615-4940","position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":305810,"name":"David Curtis","orcid":"0000-0002-8005-912X","position":6,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":246150,"name":"Maria I. Danila","orcid":"0000-0001-9246-6200","position":7,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":305811,"name":"Jeffrey R. Curtis","orcid":"0000-0002-8907-8976","position":8,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":305812,"name":"W. Benjamin Nowell","orcid":"0000-0002-4951-6476","position":9,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":305805,"name":"Michael George","orcid":"0000-0002-0398-2308","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":17,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-18T21:07:11.345501Z","pmid":"33191284","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":[]}