Which Patient Populations Have Higher Levels of Concern About the COVID-19 Pandemic?

Through his latest research, Michael George, MD, found that patients with nonautoimmune rheumatic conditions and patients with autoimmune rheumatic conditions had similar concerns about the COVID-19 pandemic. In this video, Dr George lists the patient populations that may have a heightened level of concern.

Michael George, MD, an assistant professor of rheumatology and epidemiology at the University of Pennsylvania. He also serves as a medical advisor to CreakyJoints.

Additional Resource:

George M, Venkatachalam S, Banerjee S, et al. Concerns and health-related behaviors during the COVID-19 pandemic in patients with or without autoimmune rheumatic disease in a large physician network. Abstract presented at: American College of Rheumatology Convergence 2020; November 5-9, 2020; Virtual. https://acrabstracts.org/abstract/concerns-and-health-related-behaviors-during-the-covid-19-pandemic-in-patients-with-or-without-autoimmune-rheumatic-disease-in-a-large-physician-network/ 

Video Transcript:

Michael George: One of the big take home messages is that this is affecting all of our patients. It’s not just patients with autoimmune conditions. We also found that older patients, women, racial ethnic minorities were more concerned.

We didn’t look into comorbidities in as much detail. Though from my own personal experience, I imagine had we looked into that, that would also be a big factor in patients’ concerns and behaviors. But many of those things may drive things more than whether or not they have an autoimmune condition.

Within the autoimmune disease group, we did find that patients that are on a biologic or a JAK inhibitor were substantially more concerned about the pandemic and had more social distancing than people who were not on a biologic or JAK inhibitor.