ORLANDO — Frailty independently predicted dementia, disability and loss of independence among older patients with arthritis, according to data presented at ACR Convergence.
“Arthritis is one of the most common chronic conditions in older adults,” Namrata Singh, MD, MSCI, FACP, associate professor in the division of rheumatology and fellowship program associate director at the University of Washington Medical Center, in Seattle, told Healio. “Physical frailty often shows up alongside it: weight loss, exhaustion, slow walking, weak grip and low activity.”
Arthritis

ORLANDO — A large language model cut diagnosis time by more than half, but did not significantly improve accuracy, in cases of Cogan syndrome, dermatomyositis and familial Mediterranean fever, according to data presented at ACR Convergence.
“Diagnostic delays in rheumatology motivated us to explore LLM-based support, particularly as the first medically certified systems became available without evidence on their actual use by physicians assessing rheumatology cases,” Johannes Knitza, MD, PhD, senior consultant rheumatologist and deputy head of the Institute for Digital

Kevin Waltz, OD, MD, an ophthalmologist and cofounder of EyeDura Therapeutics, died on Nov. 9.
“Dr. Waltz was an accomplished ophthalmic surgeon, researcher, educator and humanitarian whose contributions to ophthalmology and clinical research extended across the United States and throughout Latin America,” EyeDura cofounder John A. Vukich, MD, of Summit Eye Care of Wisconsin, told Healio. “Throughout his distinguished career, he played an important role in advancing ophthalmic technologies, supporting innovative clinical trials, and sharing his knowledge and expertise with physicians and

SAN DIEGO — Preprocedural nutritional assessments and changes may optimize dermatologic surgical outcomes for patients, according to a speaker at the American Society for Dermatologic Surgery Annual Meeting.
Nutrition remains an underrecognized component of procedural optimization in dermatology, even as the surgical landscape evolves, according to Kelly Frasier, DO, MS, a dermatology resident physician at Northwell Health.
“The demand for minimally invasive cosmetic procedures has continued to rise, with increasing emphasis on maximizing aesthetic outcomes while minimizing bruising, edema,

ORLANDO — Data showing the benefits of lifestyle medicine can empower patients to focus on healthy aging, according to a speaker here.
Kerry W. Reding, PhD, MPH, RN, FAHA, a professor of biobehavioral nursing and health informatics at the University of Washington, offered a presentation on what decades of research from the Women’s Health Initiative have revealed about the intersection between lifestyle medicine and longevity at the annual ACLM conference.
Healio spoke with Reding to learn more about longevity for women, the evidence behind lifestyle medicine’s effects on longevity and how that

NEW ORLEANS — In this video from the American Academy of Ophthalmology meeting, Sharon Fekrat, MD, FACS, FASRS, highlights “exciting” gene therapy programs with phase 3 trials now underway.
Fekrat, of Duke Health, detailed encouraging data on 4D-150 (4D Molecular Therapeutics), an intravitreal gene therapy, and ABBV-RGX-314 (sura-vec, Regenxbio, AbbVie), a gene therapy using subretinal delivery, both for neovascular age-related macular degeneration.
“Gene therapy is getting closer to becoming a realistic treatment option for our patients with wet AMD, but it’s

Exposure to exogenous estrogen, including hormonal birth control and menopausal hormone therapy, was associated with the better preservation of brain structure and white matter in older women, according to research published in Neurology.
The use of menopausal hormone therapy (MHT) alone was associated with less damage to the brain’s small blood vessels, said Giulia Lorenzon, PhD, postdoctoral researcher at the Yale School of Medicine.
Among APOE4 carriers, MHT use was also associated with better preservation of gray matter in parts of the brain vulnerable to Alzheimer’s disease (beta = 0.38;

ORLANDO — Diabetes risk persists in rheumatoid arthritis despite decades of improvements in treatments of both conditions, according to a speaker at ACR Convergence.
“Prior work by our group has shown that higher disease activity and pro-inflammatory cytokines increase diabetes risk in RA, and that the PREVENT CVD risk calculator performance improves when accounting for A1C,” Megan Mattison, MD, a rheumatology fellow, PGY-6, in the division of rheumatology and immunology at University of Nebraska Medical Center, told Healio. “However, it is unclear whether diabetes risk

PHOENIX — At-home self-administration of subcutaneous furosemide appeared safe and feasible for most patients with worsening heart failure who did not improve with oral diuretics, a speaker reported.
Use of a wearable, at-home subcutaneous furosemide injector (Lasix ONYU, SQ Innovation) was preferred over hospital admission in a cohort of patients with worsening HF symptoms, according to an interim analysis presented at the Heart Failure Society of America Annual Scientific Meeting.
“Congestion is a primary driver of heart failure admissions, and it’s a strong marker of

The recent FDA approvals of pharmacologic therapies for metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis were “breakthrough moments in history” for a disease whose management had mostly relied on lifestyle interventions.
However, the two drugs that drastically changed the treatment of MASH in adults — resmetirom (Rezdiffra, Madrigal Pharmaceuticals) and semaglutide (Wegovy, Novo Nordisk) — have not been approved for the treatment of MASH among patients aged younger than 18 years.
“I don’t think people understand how common [pediatric metabolic dysfunction–associated steatotic liver disease]