Adult-onset Still's disease (AOSD) is a rare disease that is classified among the multifactorial autoinflammatory disorders. It is characterised by fever, arthritis and, a typical salmon-coloured rash, and is accompanied by fever at nights. Currently, there is limited data on the prevalence of AOSD.
Patients diagnosed with AOSD at the Department of Rheumatology of Trakya University Medical Faculty, between 2003 to 2014 were reviewed retrospectively. Patients' clinical features, laboratory measurements, demographics, treatments, follow-up durations, disease courses, outcomes and complications were evaluated.
Our study included 42 patients with AOSD of whom, 32 (76.2%) were females and 10 (23.8%) were males (female to male ratio: 3.2). Over the course of the study, the annual incidence of AOSD was 0.62/100,000; and the overall prevalence was 6.77/100,000. The most common findings were fever (97.6%), arthralgia (95.2%), arthritis (76.2%), rash (73.8%) and sore throat (40.5%).
In our hospital-based study on AOSD which is a disease with very limited epidemiological data, the frequency of AOSD was found to be significantly higher than in other series. Female gender was more common in our series; and polycyclic pattern was more common in patients with longer follow-ups.