Figure 2.

Inverse probability weighted survival curves for the effect of TNF-α inhibitors vs non-biologic DMARDs on the risk of incident hypertension, dose response marginal structural model*

Abbreviations: nbDMARDs- non biologic disease modifying anti-rheumatic drugs, TNFi- tumor necrosis factor-α inhibitors.

^aCumulative treatment with TNF-α inhibitors modeled as restricted cubic splines. Model adjusted for, 1) time-fixed covariates (measured at initiation of either TNF-α inhibitor of non-biologic DMARDs): gender, diabetes, hyperlipidemia, lipid-lowering agent use, anti-diabetic medication use, obesity, smoking, combined comorbidity score, 2) time-varying covariates (updated monthly post-initiation of either TNF-α inhibitor of non-biologic DMARDs): use of NSAIDs, injectable steroids, cumulative dose of oral steroids, methotrexate use, leflunomide or cyclosporine use, other non-TNF biologic use, hospitalizations, emergency room visits, office visits, and number of distinct drugs, and age (updated every year in the study) using marginal structural models after inverse probability treatment weighting. Weights were truncated at the 1^st percentile (0.51) and 99^th percentile (1.99). Mean (SD) of the weights were 0.98 (0.19) after truncation.