Patients exposed to a surgical safety checklist experience better postoperative outcomes, but this could simply reflect wider quality of care in hospitals where checklist use is routine.

Quality of life (QoL) is a complex outcome and rheumatologic patients typically exhibit several comorbidities with a negative impact. In this study, we analyzed with respect to QoL for the first time a wide range of physical and psychological factors, including individual, clinical and disease-related parameters, mental health disorders, sexual dysfunction, and cardiovascular comorbidities among consecutive rheumatologic patients. QoL was evaluated using the EuroQol 5D (EQ-5D) utility index. The Health Assessment Questionnaire (HAQ) Disability Index, and the HAQ Pain Visual Analogue Scale were used as measures of physical disability and arthritis-related pain, respectively. The Hamilton Anxiety Scale and Zung Self-Rating Depression Scale, the International Index of Erectile Function and the Female Sexual Functioning Index were completed by all patients. In total, 360 patients were included, 301 females and 59 males. In the univariate analysis, pain, physical disability (p < 0.001 for both), disease duration (p = 0.014), anxiety and depression (p < 0.001 for both), as well as sexual dysfunction (p = 0.001 for females, p = 0.042 for males), correlated with QoL. Female sex (p < 0.001), advanced age (p = 0.029), lower educational level (p = 0.005), and cardiovascular factors (hypertension, dyslipidemia, diabetes, lack of systemic exercise) also appeared to negatively affect QoL. However, in the multiple regression model, only anxiety, pain, physical disability (p < 0.001 for all), and disease duration (p = 0.019) remained significant predictors of QoL. The emotional side and the disease-related physiological mode of rheumatic diseases appear as major independent correlates of QoL among rheumatologic patients, who may thus benefit the most from combined supportive psychological and pain-relieving interventions.

Cardiac involvement is common in rheumatoid arthritis. Subendocardial viability ratio (SEVR) is a non-invasive measure of microvascular coronary perfusion, yet it remains unclear whether it is affected in rheumatoid arthritis patients. We additionally sought predictors of SEVR in rheumatoid arthritis among a wide range of disease-related parameters, cardiac and hemodynamic factors, and markers of atherosclerosis, arteriosclerosis, and endothelial dysfunction. SEVR was estimated in rheumatoid arthritis patients and healthy controls by applanation tonometry, which was also used to evaluate arterial stiffness (pulse wave velocity and augmentation index). In the rheumatoid arthritis group, carotid intima-media thickness (cIMT) was additionally estimated by ultrasound, cardiac and hemodynamic parameters by impedance cardiography, and endothelial dysfunction by measurement of asymmetric dimethylarginine (ADMA). In a total of 122 participants, SEVR was lower among 91 patients with rheumatoid arthritis compared to 31 controls (141.4 ± 21.9 vs 153.1 ± 18.7%, p = 0.009) and remained so among 29 rheumatoid arthritis patients without hypertension, diabetes, or cardiovascular diseases, compared to the control group (139.7 ± 21.7 vs 153.1 ± 18.7%, p = 0.013). SEVR did not significantly correlate with arterial stiffness, cIMT, ADMA, or disease-related parameters. Multivariate analysis revealed gender (p = 0.007), blood pressure (p = 0.028), heart rate (p = 0.025), cholesterol levels (p = 0.008), cardiac index (p < 0.001) and left ventricular ejection time (p = 0.004) as independent predictors of SEVR among patients with rheumatoid arthritis. Patients with rheumatoid arthritis exhibit lower values of SEVR compared to healthy individuals. Cardiac and hemodynamic parameters, rather than functional indices of endothelial and macrovascular dysfunction, may be useful as predictors of myocardial perfusion in rheumatoid arthritis.