Polymyalgia rheumatica doesn’t raise risk of mortality: study

Patients' slightly higher risk of vascular death might be balanced by a reduced risk of dying from cancer, researchers say
Clare Pain
Senior Asian woman holding painful shoulder

People with polymyalgia rheumatica are unlikely to die prematurely because of their condition, according to the largest study on the subject to date.

UK researchers compared data from a primary care database for nearly 19,000 patients aged over 40 with polymyalgia rheumatica (PMR) against some 88,000 controls matched for age, sex and geographical area.