Background; The disease spondyloarthritis (SpA) have often an early onset, and can debuts already in teenagers or young adults.  Knowledge of how these patients reporting pain, fatigue and self-efficacy can help to better understand the characteristics of women and men with SpA.

Objectives: To study the differences between young women and men with SpA with regards to self-reported questionnaires on pain, fatigue and self-efficacy.

A cross sectional population based cohort were used to create a young patients with SpA.

Methods: The study is created on a cross-sectional population based cohort of patients with SpA.  They were identified through a health care register by searching for ICD-10 codes for SpA between the years 2003-2007, responding to a questionnaire survey in 2009. 201 patients, 18-36, 29% with the diagnosis of ankylosing spondylitis, 39% with psoriatic arthritis, and 32% with undifferentiated spondyloarhtritis form a subgroup of young patients eligible for analysis.  The surveys including questions concerning self-reported pain (NRS 0-10 and pain mannequin), fatigue (NRS 0-10), self-efficacy (ASES 10-100, low-high). The pain mannequin was used to categorize patients into groups; non chronic pain, chronic regional pain or chronic generalized pain. Self-reported disease activity (BASDAI 0-10) and health related quality of life (EQ5D, 0-1) were used to describe the group. Characteristic symptoms are reported as mean, standard deviation (SD) and frequencies. Mann- Whitney U test and Chi2 test were used to study gender differences.

Results: The mean age (SD) was, 30 (5) years, 60 % were women. The group reported disease activity (BASDAI) of 3.8 (2.3), quality of life 0.75 (0.16), and that they had their diagnosis for 7 (5) years. One third were smokers or former smokers, and 69 % reached WHO’s recommended level of health enhancing physical activity. Women reported higher pain 3.9 (2.4) compared to men 2.9 (2.1), p=0.001. In the group of both women and men 21 % reported regional chronic pain, 41 % generalized chronic pain and the remaining 38 % reported non chronic pain. More women reported regional and generalized chronic pain than men, p=0.026. Women reported more fatigue 5.0 (2.6) compared to men 3.9 (2.7), p=0.003, less self-efficacy for pain 53 (20), compared to men 59 (21), p=0.041 and for symptoms 59 (19) compared to men 65 (20), p=0.045.

Conclusion: A significant proportion of both women and men reported symptoms consistent with chronic generalized pain. Women reported generally impaired health compared to men, with a greater percentage with chronic pain, higher rates of pain and fatigue and reduced self-efficacy to manage pain and symptoms. This information could be valuable for clinicians in the care of young patients with SpA.