ArticleClinical rheumatology2017
The conversion rate of tuberculosis screening tests during biological therapies in patients with rheumatoid arthritis.
Article in Clinical rheumatology, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. An erratum has been issued. Cited by 15 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
15 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 28 citations in OpenAlex.
- Pooled it
- Non-TNF-targeted drugs in rheumatic diseasescombined with latent tuberculosis infection.Clinical and experimental medicine · 2026Review
- Assessment of PPD Conversion Rate in Patients Receiving Tumor Necrosis Factor-alpha Inhibitor Drugs.Iranian journal of pathology · 2026Article
- Case Report and literature review: complications of the association between rheumatoid arthritis and tuberculosis.Frontiers in medicine · 2026Article
- Tuberculin skin test repetition after TNF-α inhibitors in patients with chronic inflammatory arthritis: a long-term retrospective cohort in endemic area.Advances in rheumatology (London, England) · 2024Article
- Peritoneal Tuberculosis during Infliximab Treatment in a Patient with Ulcerative Colitis Despite a Negative Quantiferon Test.Pathogens (Basel, Switzerland) · 2021Article
- Latent Tuberculosis Infection Increases in Kidney Transplantation Recipients Compared With Transplantation Candidates: A Neglected Perspective in Tuberculosis Control.Clinical infectious diseases : an official publication of the Infectious Diseases Society of America · 2020Article
- Screening for acquired latent tuberculosis in rheumatoid arthritis patients on tumor necrosis factor inhibition therapy in Southern California.Clinical rheumatology · 2020Article
- Positive conversion of interferon-γ release assay in patients with rheumatic diseases treated with biologics.Rheumatology international · 2020Article
- Use of biologic agents and risk of tuberculosis in Brazil, a tuberculosis high-burden country.Drugs in context · 2020Article
- Tuberculosis and targeted synthetic or biologic DMARDs, beyond tumor necrosis factor inhibitors.Therapeutic advances in musculoskeletal disease · 2020Review
- Tuberculosis in Takayasu arteritis: a retrospective study in 1105 Chinese patients.Journal of geriatric cardiology : JGC · 2019Article
- Tuberculin test conversion in patients with chronic inflammatory arthritis receiving biological therapy.European journal of rheumatology · 2019Article
- [Interpretation of tuberculosis and hepatitis screening before immunosuppressive treatment].Zeitschrift fur Rheumatologie · 2018Article
- Severe bacterial sepsis results in delayed diagnosis of tuberculous lymphadenitis in a rheumatoid arthritis patient treated with adalimumab.Intractable & rare diseases research · 2018Article
Corrections and comments
- Erratum issuedErratum to: The conversion rate of tuberculosis screening tests during biological therapies in patients with rheumatoid arthritis.2017 · D'Abrsca V [corrected to D’Abrosca V]
Authors and funding
4 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Screening for active tuberculosis (TB) and latent TB infection (LTBI) is mandatory to the initiation of biological therapy in patients with rheumatic diseases. To determine the prevalence of LTBI in patients with rheumatoid arthritis before treatment with biological therapy (anti-TNF, abatacept, and tocilizumab) and the rate of TB conversion during treatment in rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients, we evaluated the file of 275 patients with RA treated with biological agents. We considered patients with negative baseline TB screening (tuberculin skin test (TST); quantiferon TB gold in tube (QFT-GIT); chest x-ray) and with rescreening for a TB assay every year. Twenty-six patients (10.6%) resulted positive to TB screening at baseline. Two hundred and forty-nine patients (mean age 55.3 ± 11.9; median 55.8 years, range 16-81.9; 210 female) with TB screening negative at baseline were enrolled. One hundred and sixty-eight (67.5%) patients were treated with anti-TNF, 37 (14.9%) patients with abatacept, and 44 (17.7%) patients with tocilizumab. After a period of 12-120 months (median 24), 34 (13.6%) patients displayed conversion of at least one screening assay. Out of the 34 patients with conversion, 6 (16.2%) were treated with abatacept, 7 (15.9%) with tocilizumab, and 21 (12.5%) with anti-TNF. During the follow-up period, no patients developed active TB. Our study shows that a proportion of patients (13.6%) converts at least one TB screening assay during biological therapy. This study underscores the American College of Rheumatology advice for annual screening in some or all biologically treated patients.
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