Dr. Jack Cush Reviews the News and Journal articles from the past week on RheumNow. This weeks highlights includes insights on scleroderma, myositis, vasculitis and answers the question - does aggressive biologic treatment of psoriasis prevent future psoriatic arthritis?

1. Massachusetts Medical Society workforce survey (600 MDs) shows that >half have cut back patient time, 55% admitted to burnout (more in women), & 1 in 4 physicians plan to leave medicine in the next two years. https://t.co/VUd101BrEi

A single center cohort study analyzed the outcome and survival of idiopathic inflammatory myositis (IIM) patients and showed good 5 and 10 year survival but showed significant declined 15-25 years post-diagnosis.

This was a retrospective single-centre analysis of IIM patients fulfilling the Bohan and Peter criteria. Patients thusly diagnosed as having 1) adult-onset polymyositis (APM), 2) adult-onset dermatomyositis (ADM), 3) juvenile-onset dermatomyositis, 4) ‘overlap’ myositis (OM), 5) cancer-associated myositis, and 6) antisynthetase syndrome.

A multinational study of rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients shows a variety of post-translationally modified anti-modified protein antibodies (AMPA). While AMPA differed in different ethnic populations, their levels correlated with total serum IgG.