Rheumatoid arthritis in Ghana - A description of an inception cohort

Abstract

Objectives: This study outlines disease characteristics in Ghanaian Rheumatoid Arthritis (RA) patients.
Design: A retrospective study.
Methods: The study was conducted by examining the records of 179 RA patients at the Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital Rheumatology Clinic between January 2013 and January 2015. Patient demographic, clinical and laboratory variables were obtained by chart review in a standard data collection form. Analysis was done using SPSS version 23. For all analysis, p values less than 0.05 were considered statistically significant.
Results: The male:female ratio was 1:4.59 with mean age of onset of 41.4 years and disease duration of 64 (12.8- 140) weeks. Rheumatoid factor was positive in 78 (43.6%) and anti-cyclic citrullinated peptide in 100 (55.9%). Constitutional symptoms of fever and fatigue were common and anaemia was the most common extra articular feature.
Conclusion: In this first study of RA in Ghanaians, the key findings were similarities between our patients and other West African populations that mimic Caucasian populations in age, sex and joint distribution, a relatively low joint count, few extra articular manifestations and little nodal disease.

Key words: Rheumatoid arthritis, Sub- Saharan Africa, Geographic differences, Disease characteristics