Frequency of fertility-related factors in women with rheumatoid arthritis referred to rheumatology clinic of Rafsanjan city, 2020

Rheumatoid arthritis is a chronic disease with unknown etiology and can affect various aspects of women's lives, especially pregnancy and their consequences. The present study was performed aimed to evaluate fertility-related factors in women with rheumatoid arthritis.

This descriptive-analytic study was performed on 100 women with rheumatoid arthritis and 100 healthy women in 2020. The diagnosis of rheumatoid arthritis was based on ACR 2010 / EULAR criteria and rheumatologist approval. Demographic and fertility-related information included first menstrual age, age of menopause, menstrual regularity, number of pregnancies, history of infertility and use of assisted reproductive drugs, duration of infertility and disease severity according to DAS.28 criteria. Data were analyzed by SPSS software (version 20) and Independent T-test and Chi-square test. P<0.05 was considered statistically significant.

The mean duration of the disease was 49.14±49.57 months and the severity of the disease was moderate in half of the patients. The number of pregnancies and deliveries did not differ significantly between the two groups (P> 0.05). A history of abortion was reported in 33% of RA women and 56% of healthy women (P = 0.007). The history of primary and secondary infertility was less in women with rheumatoid arthritis than healthy women (P = 0.017 and P = 0.542, respectively) and the use of assisted reproductive drugs was more frequent in healthy women (P = 0.224).

In this study, pregnancy-related factors such as the frequency of abortion, history of primary infertility and the use of assisted reproductive drugs were reported less in women with rheumatoid arthritis than healthy women. It is necessary to examine these findings in future studies with more sample sizes and selection of more than one control group.