Tight control of disease activity fails to improve body composition or physical function in rheumatoid arthritis patients

Objective. RA typically features “rheumatoid cachexia” (loss of muscle mass (MM) and excessive fat mass (FM), especially trunk FM), which contributes to physical disability. Since rheumatoid cachexia is driven by inflammation, it would be anticipated that the success of tight control of disease activity, such as “treat-to-target” (T2T), in attenuating inflammation would benefit body composition and physical function. This cross-sectional study assessed the impact of T2T on body composition and objectively-assessed function in RA patients.