Prevalence of ANCA-Associated Vasculitis in Adults in Colombia: A Real-World Data Analysis

OBJECTIVES: To determine the prevalence of ANCA-associated vasculitis (AAV) in adults over 18 years old in Colombia between January 1, 2018, and December 31, 2022.

METHODS: We analyzed information obtained from the official database of the Ministry of Health, in the five-year period. Information was taken from people over 18 years of age who were diagnosed with any of the three subtypes of AAV: granulomatosis with polyangiitis (GPA), microscopic polyangiitis (MPA), and eosinophilic granulomatosis with polyangiitis (EGPA). To estimate the prevalence per million inhabitants, the total number of individuals treated during that five-year period was used as the denominator.

RESULTS: Over the five-year period, there were 2,446 patients diagnosed with AAV (females 1,534, 62.7%), with a mean age of 53.9 years (53,8 for GPA, 55,8 for MPA, and 52,7 for EGPA). Of these 2,446, 1,733 (70.9%) were GPA, and 103 patients (4.2%) were registered with more than one diagnosis. The crude five-year prevalence rate of AAV was 66.9 per million adults (77.2 in females, 54.7 in males), and the female-to-male ratio was 1.68. Specific five-year prevalence for each subtype (and female-to-male ratio) was 47.4 per million adults for GPA (1.60), 11.7 for MPA (1.74), and 10.6 for EGPA (1.87).

CONCLUSIONS: This is the first study to describe the prevalence of all AAV in Colombia, presenting data comparable to that of the United Kingdom, Germany, and Argentina.