Abstract: RESEARCH PAPER Prevalence of coronavirus disease 2019 in a multiethnic cohort of patients with autoimmune rheumatic diseases in Qatar Karima Becetti1*, Eman Satti1*, Betsy Varughese2, Yousef Al Rimawi1, Rawan Sheikh Saleh1, Nawal Hadwan1, Miral H Gharib1, Mohamed Awni Al Kahlout1, Essa Abuhelaiqa3, Hadil Afif Ashour1, Rajvir Singh4, Samar Al Emadi1 Address for Correspondence: Karima Becetti, Eman Satti1* 1 Division of Rheumatology, Department of Medicine, Hamad Medical Corporation, Doha, Qatar 2 Gastroenterology & Hepatology, Medicine, Hamad Medical Corporation, Doha, Qatar 3 Division of Nephrology, Department of Medicine, Hamad Medical Corporation, Doha, Qatar 4 Cardiology Research Center, Heart Hospital, Hamad Medical Corporation, Doha, Qatar *These authors contributed equally to this work Email: becettikarima@gmail.com http://doi.org/10.5339/qmj.2022.37 Submitted: 13 January 2022 Accepted: 25 May 2022 © 2022 Becetti, Satti, Varughese, Al Rimawi, Saleh, Hadwan, Gharib, Al Kahlout, Abuhelaiqa, Ashour, Singh, Al Emadi, licensee HBKU Press. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution license CC BY 4.0, which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Cite this article as: Becetti K, Satti E, Varughese B, Al Rimawi Y, Saleh RS, Hadwan N, Gharib MH, Al Kahlout MA, Abuhelaiqa E, Ashour HA, Singh R, Al Emadi S. Prevalence of coronavirus disease 2019 in a multiethnic cohort of patients with autoimmune rheumatic diseases in Qatar, Qatar Medical Journal 2022(3):37 http://doi.org/10.5339/qmj.2022.37 ABSTRACT Background: Autoimmune rheumatic diseases (ARDs) are characterized by immune dysfunction and associated with an increased risk of infections, which were of significant concern during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. Variable rates of COVID-19 incidence have been reported in patients with ARDs; however, the true effect of this infection on this patient population is still unclear. We, therefore, aimed to evaluate the COVID-19 prevalence among a multiethnic cohort of patients with ARDs in Qatar. Material and Methods: We used telephonic surveys to collect demographic and clinical information of patients with ARD in Qatar between April 1 and July 31, 2020, including any close contact with a COVID19 case at home or work and polymerase chain reaction (PCR)-confirmed COVID-19 diagnosis. An electronic medical records review was conducted to verify pertinent data collected through the surveys. Prevalence with 95% confidence interval (CI), Student’s t-tests, and chi-square/Fisher’s exact tests were used for univariate analyses, whereas multivariate logistic regression was used to identify factors associated with COVID-19. Results: The study included 700 patients with ARD (mean age, 43.2 ^ 12.3 years), and 73% were female. Until July 2020, 75 (11%, 95% CI 9% –13%) patients had COVID-19. Factors associated with COVID-19 included being a man (adjusted odds ratio [aOR] 2.56, 95% CI 1.35–4.88, p ¼ 0.01) and having close contact with a COVID-19 case (aOR 27.89, 95% CI 14.85–52.38, p ¼ 0.01). Disease severity and rheumatic medications had no significant QATAR MEDICAL JOURNAL 1 VOL. 2022 / ART. 37 Prevalence of coronavirus disease 2019 in a multiethnic cohort of patients with autoimmune rheumatic diseases association with the odds of contracting COVID-19. In the 86 patients with ARD having close contact,..