Foti Rosario, Amato Giorgio, Dal Bosco Ylenia, Longo Antonio, Gagliano Caterina, Falsaperla Raffaele, Foti Roberta, Speranza Sergio, De Lucia Francesco, Visalli Elisa
Rheumatology Unit, Policlinico San Marco Hospital, 95123 Catania, Italy.
Eye Clinic, Policlinico San Marco Hospital, 95123 Catania, Italy.
Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2022 Mar 8;19(6):3161. doi: 10.3390/ijerph19063161.
The management of patients with immuno-rheumatological diseases has profoundly changed during the COVID-19 pandemic and telemedicine has played an important role in the disease follow-up. In addition to monitoring disease activity and any adverse events, especially infectious events, assessing the psychological situation of the patient can be fundamental. Furthermore, COVID-19 has a serious impact on mental health and, since the beginning of the pandemic, a significantly higher incidence of anxiety disorders and depressive symptoms especially in younger people was observed. In this study, we evaluated the incidence of depressive disorders, anxiety, and fibromyalgia (FM) in our patients with rheumatoid arthritis and psoriatic arthritis during the lockdown period due to the COVID-19 pandemic and we validate the use of telemedicine in the clinical management of these patients. Mental and physical stress during the COVID-19 pandemic can greatly worsen FM symptoms and intensify patients' suffering without a clinical flare of the inflammatory disease for patients affected by rheumatoid arthritis. Telemedicine has allowed us to identify patients who needed a face-to-face approach for therapeutic reevaluation even if not related to a flare of the inflammatory disease. Even if our data does not allow us to draw definitive conclusions regarding the effectiveness of telemedicine as greater than or equal to the standard face-to-face approach, we continue to work by modifying our approach to try to ensure the necessary care in compliance with safety and, optimistically, this tool will become an important part of rheumatic disease management.
在新冠疫情期间，免疫风湿性疾病患者的管理方式发生了深刻变化，远程医疗在疾病随访中发挥了重要作用。除了监测疾病活动及任何不良事件，尤其是感染事件外，评估患者的心理状况也至关重要。此外，新冠疫情对心理健康有严重影响，自疫情开始以来，观察到焦虑症和抑郁症状的发病率显著升高，尤其是在年轻人中。在本研究中，我们评估了在因新冠疫情而实施封锁期间，类风湿关节炎和银屑病关节炎患者中抑郁症、焦虑症及纤维肌痛（FM）的发病率，并验证了远程医疗在这些患者临床管理中的应用。对于类风湿关节炎患者，新冠疫情期间的心理和身体压力会极大地加重FM症状并加剧患者痛苦，而炎症性疾病并无临床活动。远程医疗使我们能够识别出即使与炎症性疾病发作无关但仍需要面对面进行治疗重新评估的患者。即使我们的数据无法就远程医疗的有效性是否大于或等于标准面对面方法得出明确结论，我们仍在不断调整方法，努力在确保安全的情况下提供必要的护理，乐观地说，这个工具将成为风湿性疾病管理的重要组成部分。
