Damage in the anca-associated vasculitides: long-term data from the European Vasculitis Study group (EUVAS) therapeutic trials
Robson J., Doll H., Suppiah R., Flossmann O., Harper L., Höglund P., Jayne D., Mahr A., Westman K., Luqmani R.
<jats:sec><jats:title>Objectives</jats:title><jats:p>To describe short-term (up to 12 months) and long-term (up to 7 years) damage in patients with newly diagnosed antineutrophil-cytoplasm antibody-associated vasculitis (AAV).</jats:p></jats:sec><jats:sec><jats:title>Methods</jats:title><jats:p>Data were combined from six European Vasculitis Study group trials (n=735). Long-term follow-up (LTFU) data available for patients from four trials (n=535). Damage accrued was quantified by the Vasculitis Damage Index (VDI). Sixteen damage items were defined a priori as being potentially treatment-related.</jats:p></jats:sec><jats:sec><jats:title>Results</jats:title><jats:p>VDI data were available for 629 of 735 patients (85.6%) at baseline, at which time 217/629 (34.5%) had ≥1 item of damage and 32 (5.1%) ≥5 items, reflecting disease manifestations prior to diagnosis and trial enrolment. LTFU data were available for 467/535 (87.3%) at a mean of 7.3 years postdiagnosis. 302/535 patients (56.4%) had VDI data at LTFU, with 104/302 (34.4%) having ≥5 items and only 24 (7.9%) no items of damage. At 6 months and LTFU, the most frequent items were proteinuria, impaired glomerular filtration rate, hypertension, nasal crusting, hearing loss and peripheral neuropathy. The frequency of damage, including potentially treatment-related damage, rose over time (p<0.01). At LTFU, the most commonly reported items of treatment-related damage were hypertension (41.5%; 95% CI 35.6 to 47.4%), osteoporosis (14.1%; 9.9 to 18.2%), malignancy (12.6%; 8.6 to 16.6%), and diabetes (10.4%; 6.7 to 14.0%).</jats:p></jats:sec><jats:sec><jats:title>Conclusions</jats:title><jats:p>In AAV, renal, otolaryngological and treatment-related (cardiovascular, disease, diabetes, osteoporosis and malignancy) damage increases over time, with around one-third of patients having ≥5 items of damage at a mean of 7 years postdiagnosis.</jats:p></jats:sec>