Objective:

To estimate the prevalence and describe the main demographic characteristics of rheumatoid arthritis in adults in Colombia.

Material and methods:

A descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted using the data taken from the Integral Information System of Social Protection of the Ministry of Health during the years 2012-2016.

Results:

A total of 248,995 cases were identified, which gave an estimated prevalence of 0.52% in those older than 18 years of age. The large majority (80.7% were women, with a female: male ratio of 4.2:1, and there was a higher prevalence in the 70-74 years age group. The departments with the highest number of cases were Bogota DC (64,121), followed by Antioquia (43,771), but the departments with the highest prevalence were Cesar (1.13%), Casanare (0.96%), and Risaralda (0.93%).

Conclusions:

Demographic and epidemiological information on rheumatoid arthritis in Colombia is presented. A similar prevalence is reported in other studies from the region, like Brazil (0.46%), Venezuela (0.4%), or Peru (0.55%), but lower than Argentina (0.94%) or Mexico (1.6%).

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