Abstract: The effect of hydroxychloroquine against SARSCoV-2 infection in rheumatoid arthritis patients Okan Küçükakkaş (  okan4494@yahoo.com ) Bezmialem Vakıf University https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6971-4229 Teoman Aydın Bezmialem Vakıf University https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0902-6771 Research Article Keywords: SARS-CoV-2, hydroxychloroquine, rheumatoid arthritis, prophylaxis, treatment DOI: https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-43812/v1 License:   This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Read Full License Page 1/11 Abstract INTRODUCTION: The effectiveness of hydroxychloroquine in SARS-CoV-2 prophylaxis and treatment is still controversial. In this study, our aim is to investigate the potential effects of hydroxychloroquine therapy on patients with diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis and a con rmed SARS-CoV-2 infection. METHOD: We included patients who were followed up with a diagnosis of rheumatoid arthritis and whose SARS-CoV-2 infection was con rmed. The patients were divided into two groups as those who previously used hydroxychloroquine and those who did not, and were compared in terms of clinical and laboratory data. RESULTS: Our study included 17 patients with adequate data (2 males, 15 females). The mean age of the patients was 57.2 ± 11.6 years. 7 (41.2%) patients were receiving hydroxychloroquine regularly for the last 6 months. When the effect of hydroxychloroquine on clinical and laboratory parameters of patients was examined, there was no signi cant difference between the groups of patients using and not using hydroxychloroquine. The patients using and not using hydroxychloroquine were compared for the presence of typical SARS-CoV-2 infection ndings on computed tomography images, admission to the hospital and intensive care. No signi cant differences were observed between these two groups. CONCLUSIONS: Many studies on the effectiveness of hydroxychloroquine use in SARS-CoV-2 infection are still ongoing. Due to its importance in rheumatology practice, it is very important to clarify the position of hydroxychloroquine in SARS-CoV-2 therapy. Our ndings suggest that having previously used hydroxychloroquine does not have any negative or positive effect on the infection.