ACR Meeting Abstracts

ACR Meeting Abstracts

  • Meetings
    • ACR Convergence 2024
    • ACR Convergence 2023
    • 2023 ACR/ARP PRSYM
    • ACR Convergence 2022
    • ACR Convergence 2021
    • ACR Convergence 2020
    • 2020 ACR/ARP PRSYM
    • 2019 ACR/ARP Annual Meeting
    • 2018-2009 Meetings
    • Download Abstracts
  • Keyword Index
  • Advanced Search
  • Your Favorites
    • Favorites
    • Login
    • View and print all favorites
    • Clear all your favorites
  • ACR Meetings

Abstract Number: PP21

What Lies Beneath: Making Rheumatoid Arthritis Visible for the Seronegative Patient Through Blood Work

Shilpa Venkatachalam, Global Healthy Living Foundation, New York, NY

Meeting: ACR Convergence 2022

Keywords: autoimmune diseases, rheumatoid arthritis

  • Tweet
  • Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window) Email
  • Click to print (Opens in new window) Print
Session Information

Date: Saturday, November 12, 2022

Title: Patient Perspectives Poster

Session Type: Poster Session A

Session Time: 1:00PM-3:00PM

Background/Purpose: When I first received my Rheumatoid Arthritis (RA) diagnosis 5 years ago, I experienced a combination of relief and disbelief. Relief because now all my symptoms made sense. Denial and disbelief because my blood work did not show autoantibodies and my Rheumatoid Factor (RF) was initially negative. I was diagnosed with seronegative RA and was recommended to immediately start treatment with disease modifying anti-rheumatic drugs (DMARDs)and glucocorticoids to curb inflammation.

Intervention: My RA journey with medications has been one of trial and error, much like it tends to be for many of us. I felt frustrated and scared as I cycled through the conventional DMARDs, then a couple of the Janus kinase (JAK) inhibitors and then a few of the anti-tumor necrosis factor (anti-TNF) agents. Every time a flare (re)surfaces, I am once again transported to the beginning of my RA journey, where I am faced with a reckoning about whether or not I will ever feel better, whether I need to switch a medication, and why it has stopped working for me, whether another medication will work and if so, then for how long, and how to cope with anxiety around potentially failing this medication, too? It is like feeling the uncertainty of diagnosis all over again. That is why it helped when I was able to get a test of my disease activity using biomarkers. I finally believed I had RA when I saw my test score. It gave me a sense of how bad my inflammation was and how bad it was likely to get. Seeing my score was not low helped me make treatment decisions and get aggressive with my treatment. However, in the end, I was still unable to ascertain which medication would be more likely to work for me to help me feel better with less pain, stiffness, and fatigue.

Maintenance: Having a visual representation of inflammation was particularly important to me for my RA where almost everything remains invisible. When I was able to put a score to my inflammation, it helped me to stay on and modify treatment because I wanted to see my disease activity score go down. For someone with seronegative RA like me, the visibility of “seeing” my RA was what got me to stay on treatment.

Quality of Life: Believing that I have RA was half the battle won for me. It meant I could move forward from denial to doing things about my disease including initiating and staying on treatment and adding non-pharmacological approaches to manage my RA. Molecular tests and blood tests do more than just help the physician to understand the pathophysiology of a disease. It helps those of us living with a disease to “see” and “believe” it, which in turn prompts us to make treatment decisions that ultimately help us feel better.

Supporting image 1

Table. My 5-Year Journey as a Seronegative Rheumatoid Arthritis Patient

Supporting image 2

Figure. Coming Full Circle: Diagnosis to Acceptance


Disclosures: S. Venkatachalam, None.

To cite this abstract in AMA style:

Venkatachalam S. What Lies Beneath: Making Rheumatoid Arthritis Visible for the Seronegative Patient Through Blood Work [abstract]. Arthritis Rheumatol. 2022; 74 (suppl 9). https://acrabstracts.org/abstract/what-lies-beneath-making-rheumatoid-arthritis-visible-for-the-seronegative-patient-through-blood-work/. Accessed .
  • Tweet
  • Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window) Email
  • Click to print (Opens in new window) Print

« Back to ACR Convergence 2022

ACR Meeting Abstracts - https://acrabstracts.org/abstract/what-lies-beneath-making-rheumatoid-arthritis-visible-for-the-seronegative-patient-through-blood-work/

Advanced Search

Your Favorites

You can save and print a list of your favorite abstracts during your browser session by clicking the “Favorite” button at the bottom of any abstract. View your favorites »

All abstracts accepted to ACR Convergence are under media embargo once the ACR has notified presenters of their abstract’s acceptance. They may be presented at other meetings or published as manuscripts after this time but should not be discussed in non-scholarly venues or outlets. The following embargo policies are strictly enforced by the ACR.

Accepted abstracts are made available to the public online in advance of the meeting and are published in a special online supplement of our scientific journal, Arthritis & Rheumatology. Information contained in those abstracts may not be released until the abstracts appear online. In an exception to the media embargo, academic institutions, private organizations, and companies with products whose value may be influenced by information contained in an abstract may issue a press release to coincide with the availability of an ACR abstract on the ACR website. However, the ACR continues to require that information that goes beyond that contained in the abstract (e.g., discussion of the abstract done as part of editorial news coverage) is under media embargo until 10:00 AM ET on November 14, 2024. Journalists with access to embargoed information cannot release articles or editorial news coverage before this time. Editorial news coverage is considered original articles/videos developed by employed journalists to report facts, commentary, and subject matter expert quotes in a narrative form using a variety of sources (e.g., research, announcements, press releases, events, etc.).

Violation of this policy may result in the abstract being withdrawn from the meeting and other measures deemed appropriate. Authors are responsible for notifying colleagues, institutions, communications firms, and all other stakeholders related to the development or promotion of the abstract about this policy. If you have questions about the ACR abstract embargo policy, please contact ACR abstracts staff at [email protected].

Wiley

  • Online Journal
  • Privacy Policy
  • Permissions Policies
  • Cookie Preferences

© Copyright 2025 American College of Rheumatology