gms | German Medical Science

Background: Representative and up-to-date data on the epidemiology of gout in Germany is scarce. We aimed to study the prevalence and incidence of gout in Germany based on claims data.

Methods: We used data from the InGef research database to estimate the prevalence and incidence of gout in 2016. We considered gout cases as patients with (i) main hospital discharge diagnosis of gout (ICD-10 code M10), (ii) a verified ambulatory diagnosis or secondary hospital diagnosis of gout in combination with a claim for an uric acid test or prescription of urate lowering treatment/gout flare treatment or (iii) a verified ambulatory diagnosis or hospital diagnosis of hyperuricemia (ICD-10 code E79.0) in combination with a prescription of gout flare treatment. For the analysis of the incidence, patients with a prior diagnosis of gout, ULT or gout flare treatment in 2015 were excluded. The prevalence and the incidence of gout per 100 persons was calculated overall as well as stratified by sex and age-group. In addition, the overall prevalence and incidence was standardized according to the age and sex distribution of the German population in 2016 to obtain representative results.

Results: The study population comprised approximately 3.65 million persons with a mean age of 44.8 years and 49% females. The crude overall prevalence of gout was 1.71% (95%-confidence interval: 1.70%-1.73%). The standardized prevalence was 1.63% (1.62%-1.64%) corresponding to an estimated number of 1.325 million gout patients in Germany. The crude incidence was 0.44% (0.43%-0.45%) and the standardized incidence 0.45% (0.44%-0.46%). The male-to-female ratio was 3.2 for the prevalence and 2.7 for the incidence. The standardized prevalence and incidence in the working population (age 18-65 years) was 1.19% (1.18-1.20%) and 0.38% (0.37%-0.39%), respectively. We observed the highest age-specific prevalence and incidence of gout in the age group 80-89 years (Figure 1 [Fig. 1]).

Conclusion: The prevalence of gout was slightly higher compared to previous studies analyzing German claims data [1] and the incidence was higher compared to European studies [2]. Further analyses are planned on patients diagnosed vs. treated and the burden of the disease on the integrated stakeholders of the German healthcare ecosystem including the patient.