Influence of Anti-TNF and Disease Modifying Antirheumatic Drugs Therapy on Pulmonary Forced Vital Capacity Associated to Ankylosing Spondylitis: A 2-Year Follow-Up Observational Study

Table 2

Secondary outcomes. Intragroup changes of selected clinical variables.

Variable	Baseline	12 months	P	24 months
DMARDs group ()
BASDAI, units	5 (3–8.0)	3 (1–6)	<0.001	1 (0–3)	<0.001
BASFI, units	6 (3–7)	3 (1–5)	<0.001	1 (0–3)	<0.001
Post-6MWT Borg scale	2.2 (0–4.6)	1.0 (0–3.8)	0.001	0.5 (0–2.1)	0.003
6MWT, m	282 (235–386)	308 (280–425)	<0.001	334 (307–440)	<0.001
Total SGRQ%	37 (3–58)	9 (0–53)	<0.001	0 (0–20)	0.003
anti-TNF + DMARDs group ()
BASDAI, units	5 (4–8)	2 (1–5)	<0.001	0 (0-1)	<0.001
BASFI, units	5 (3–8)	2 (1.0–4.3)	<0.001	1 (0-1)	<0.001
Post-6MWT Borg scale	2.2 (0–4.1)	1.3 (0–3)	0.001	0.5 (0–1.1)	0.002
6MWT, m	322 (230–380)	368 (280–440)	<0.001	400 (315–460)	<0.001
Total SGRQ%	29 (3–58)	7 (0–34)	0.001	0 (0–4)	0.011

DMARDs group, group receiving disease modifying antirheumatic drugs; anti-TNF + DMARDs group, group receiving antitumor necrosis factor agents + DMARDs; BASDAI, Bath Ankylosing Spondylitis Disease Activity Index; BASFI, Bath Ankylosing Spondylitis Functioning Index; 6MWT, six-minute walk test; SGRQ, St. George’s Respiratory Questionnaire. Quantitative variables are presented as medians (and ranges); qualitative variables are presented in number (%). values were obtained using Wilcoxon test comparing responses at 12 and 24 months with the baseline. Significant difference with two-factor ANOVA Friedman test .