¹Suad Hannawi, ²Mohammed Abdalla Yousef, ²Issa Al Salmi, ²Farida Al Balushi, ²Faisal Al Ismaili, ²Abdelmassiah Metry, ²Alan Hola

¹Emirates Health Services, ²Royal Hospital

Background:

Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is a chronic inflammatory disease that has various manifestations among different populations. This study aimed to estimate the various medical comorbidities associated with SLE at the time of presentations among Omanis.

Material(s) and Method(s):

This is a retrospective analysis using patients’ registry medical information system (AlShifa system). All patients diagnosed with SLE were reviewed by accessing their medical records and laboratory results at the Royal Hospital-Muscat, Oman, from 2006 to 2014. The following comorbidities were analyzed: diabetes mellitus (DM), hypertension (HTN) hyperlipidemia, lung disease, cardiovascular disease (CVD), cerebrovascular accident (CVA), chronic kidney disease (CKD), end-stage kidney disease (ESKD), infection, thyroid diseases, osteoporosis, malignancy, and the number of miscarriages.

Results:

In Oman, there were 966 patients diagnosed with SLE during the period from 2006 to 2014. The mean (SD) of age at presentation was 35.5 (11.5) years. The majority of patients were female (88.7%) with a mean age of 27.6 (1.4) years. At presentation, 24.5% had HTN, 19.1% hyperlipidemia, 12.2% miscarriages, 12% with thyroid diseases, 10% CVD, 5.81% with DM, 5% CVA, 4.1% CKD, 2.8% with ESKD needing dialysis, 2.5% with osteoporosis, 1.49 with infections and 0.53% with malignancy.

Conclusion:

The SLE patients have a greater burden of various medical comorbidities and are more likely to develop CVD, stroke, CKD, ESKD and even needing renal replacement therapy at the time of diagnosis. Strengthen the health system at the primary level and educating of public and health workforce is the main challenge to further reduce these presentations and their consequences.