Work participation is reduced during the development of RA, months before clinical arthritis manifests

OBJECTIVES: We investigated whether work participation is affected in patients with arthralgia during transition to RA. Arthralgia patients with symptom resolution and early RA patients at diagnosis were used as a reference. METHODS: Three groups of patients were studied: arthralgia patients converting to RA (n = 114), arthralgia patients with spontaneous symptom resolution (n = 57), and early RA patients (n = 617). Both presenteeism (i.e. working while sick, scale 0–10) and absenteeism (i.e. sick leave) were taken into account. Work ability 1 year prior to clinical arthritis was estimated (in absolute numbers). The course of work restriction over time was studied using linear mixed models (β coefficient; delta per month) within each patient group. RESULTS: One-year prior to the development of clinical arthritis, mean presenteeism was 7.0 (95% CI 5.8, 8.1) in patients with arthralgia, indicating 30% loss, and further worsened to 6.1 (95% CI 5.3, 6.6) at RA diagnosis, thus indicating 39% loss. In early RA patients, presenteeism improved over time after DMARD initiation (β 0.052 per month 95% CI 0.042, 0.061, P < 0.0001). Presenteeism also improved in arthralgia patients who achieved spontaneous symptom resolution (β 0.063 per month, 95% CI 0.024, 0.10, P = 0.002). Absenteeism did not change significantly in arthralgia patients, but did improve in RA after DMARD-start. ACPA stratification revealed similar results. CONCLUSION: In the months preceding RA, presenteeism was already apparent, and it worsened further during progression to clinical arthritis and diagnosis. This underlines the relevance of the symptomatic pre-RA phase for patients. The observed reversibility in arthralgia patients with symptom resolution may suggest that intervention in pre-RA could improve work participation.