QRISK3-based analysis of cardiovascular risk factors in patients with long-term but well-controlled systemic lupus erythematosus.

Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is a multisystem inflammatory disease of unknown etiology. Corticosteroids and immunosuppressive agents are the principal forms of treatment for this condition. While cardiovascular disease (CVD) is known to be a major cause of death in patients with SLE, there has been no improvement over the last few decades with regard to diagnosis, treatment, or prognosis. The QRISK3 algorithm is a new algorithm that includes SLE-related risk factors; this tool can predict the risk of CVD over a ten-year period. In this study, involving 180 patients, we compared the performance of the Framingham risk score, the recalibrated risk prediction SCORE, and QRISK3 for the assessment of CVD in patients with a long course of disease and low disease activity. Then, we used a more efficient algorithm, QRISK3 to identify the risk factors for CVD. This was a prospective and cross-sectional study involving 116 patients. All patients fulfilled the ACR criteria. The systemic lupus erythematosus disease activity index 2000 (SLEDAI-2K) is widely used to assess disease activity in SLE patients; patients with a SLEDAI-2K less than or equal to 4 are considered to be stable. Thus, we defined well-controlled patients as those with a SLEDAI-2K score less than or equal to 4. The dose of glucocorticoid (GC) that patients received was less or equal to 10 mg per day. We recorded and assessed a range of traditional risk factors, current treatments, comorbidities, data at the time of onset, and SLE-related evaluations. The QRISK3 score, and the relative risk (RR) that this score defined, were used to estimate the risk of CVD in patients with SLE. According to these relative risks, the patients were divided into low- (n=28), intermediate- (n=46), and high-relative risk (n=31) groups for subgroup analysis. Of the 116 patients enrolled, 105 were eligible to be assessed for the risk of CVD. By univariate analyses, the RR was significantly related with age at the time of enrolment (<0.001), age at onset (<0.001), resting heart rate (RHR) (<0.001), present dose of GCs (<0.001), present SLEDAI-2K (=0.015), aerobic exercise (<0.001), initial SLEDAI-2K (<0.001), and initial dose of GCs (=0.048). In the multiple linear regression model, the RR of CVD was significantly correlated with the initial SLEDAI-2K score (β=2.112, <0.001), initial dose of GCs (β=-0.009, =0.041), resting heart rate (β=0.241, =0.003) and age at onset (β=-0.208, =0.004). Pearson's correlation showed that RHR was significantly associated with aerobic exercise (r=-0.322, p=0.001). Subgroup analysis further identified a positive correlation between the history of nephritis, metabolic syndrome (MetS), aerobic exercise, present dose of GCs, and the RR of CVD. Patients with long-term but well-controlled SLE had a high relative risk of CVD and that this was associated with resting heart rate (P=0.003), history of lupus nephritis (P<0.001), initial SLEDAI-2K score (P<0.001), and metabolic syndrome (P=0.017). However, age at onset (P<0.001), use of hydroxychloroquine (P=0.30) and Mycophenolate mofetil (P=0.01), and the initial dose of glucocorticoid (P=0.049), were protective factors. Younger SLE patients had a significantly higher relative risk of CVD than older patients (p<0.001). QRISK3 detected more SLE patients at high risk of CVD when compared to the Framingham and recalibrate SCORE. To reduce the risk of CVD in SLE patients, measures should be taken both during the initial stages of disease and for long-term management.