Death in young people with Juvenile Idiopathic Arthritis (JIA) is exceedingly rare

What is it about?

Juvenile Idiopathic Arthritis (JIA) is an auto-immune condition that starts in childhood, diagnosed in before the age of 16 years old. It affects approximately 1 or 2 in every 2’000 children and young people. Many adult-onset rheumatological conditions have been shown to increase the risk of death (mortality) compared with the general population. However, recent research using healthcare data from the Nordic countries have found conflicting results of whether those with JIA have increased risk of mortality versus the general population. What was discovered? This research aimed to investigate mortality in young people with JIA using information from General Practice (GPs; primary care) in England. There were 4’762 patients with JIA identified, and 13’957 similar patients without JIA. These patients were followed for an average of 10 years and over this time there were 30 deaths in the JIA patients: mortality rate of 6.2 per 10’000 person year. Compared with the non-JIA patients, patients with JIA had 3 times higher mortality. Mortality in JIA patients was also compared to the general population (taken from the Office for National Statistics) and similarly, patients with JIA had 3 times higher mortality than you would expect given the calendar year and their age and gender. Causes of death were similar between JIA patients and the non-JIA patients. In addition, for the JIA patients, 3 in 5 of the JIA deaths occurred before 2012, and those who had reported to have systemic JIA had 3 times higher mortality versus those with non-systemic JIA.

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Photo by Apaha Spi on Unsplash

Photo by Apaha Spi on Unsplash

Why is it important?

This research investigated mortality in young people with JIA in England. Death in young people with JIA is exceedingly rare; compared with the non-JIA patients there was approximately one additional death for every 2’500 years of follow-up. This means that for every 2’500 people with JIA each year, there is an expected one additional death over and above what you would expect to have seen. The mortality in patients with systemic JIA was slightly higher, and over half the deaths occurred prior to 2012 when biologic treatment, particularly for systemic JIA, was limited.

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