Table 2.
Cytopaenias observed, treatment received and infections rate throughout the follow-up time
| Patient characteristics throughout the disease | Neutropaenic n=58 |
Non–neutropaenic n=713 |
P values |
| Laboratory | |||
| Anaemia,* n (%) | 25 (43.1) | 210 (29.5) | 0.04 |
| Thrombopenia,† n (%) | 1 (1.7) | 5 (0.70) | 0.375 |
| Leucopaenia,‡ n (%) | 41 (70.7) | 23 (3.43) | <0.0001 |
| Lymphopaenia,§ n (%) | 13 (22.4) | 98 (13.7) | 0.08 |
| Treatment | |||
| Methotrexate, n (%) | 52 (89.6) | 590/667 (88.4) | 1.000 |
| Sulfasalazine, n (%) | 33 (56.9) | 342/667 (51.2) | 0.494 |
| Hydroxychloroquine, n (%) | 31 (53.4) | 345/667 (51.7) | 0.891 |
| Leflunomide, n (%) | 3 (5.2) | 43/667 (6.4) | 1.000 |
| Azathioprine, n (%) | 1 (1.7) | 3/667 (0.5) | 0.281 |
| Prednisone oral, n (%) | 4 (7.0) | 67/667 (10.0) | 0.644 |
| Corticosteroids intramuscularly, n (%) | 48 (82.8) | 573/667 (80.3) | 0.559 |
| Antitumour necrosis factor, n (%) | 5 (8.6) | 30/667 (4.5) | 0.189 |
| Abatacept, n (%) | 0 (0.0) | 3/667 (0.5) | 1.000 |
| Tocilizumab, n (%) | 0 (0.0) | 11/667 (1.7) | 1.000 |
| Rituximab, n (%) | 0 (0.0) | 10/667 (1.5) | 1.000 |
| Outcomes | |||
| Infections, incidence rate (95% CI)¶ | 4.43 (1.62 to 9.66) | 3.87 (2.92 to 5.04) | 0.878 |
*Haemoglobin <135 g/L for men and haemoglobin <120 g/L for women.
†Platelets <100×10^9/L
‡White cell count: <4×109/L.
§Lymphocytes: <1×109/L.
¶Incidence rate is expressed as events per 1000 person-months.