SjöGren’s Disease and the Impact of COVID-19 on Mental Health

Objectives: The purpose of this study was to assess and compare patients with Sjögren’s disease who reported testing positive for COVID-19 and those who did not, in changes in perceived issues related to mental health.
Methods: Data were collected using an IRB-approved survey developed by the study team utilizing Qualtrics. Survey questions were optimized through face and content validity testing. Recruitment was conducted via Sjögren’s disease support groups and the Sjögren’s Foundation. The analysis was performed using the chi-square test except in instances of small expected cell counts, for which Fisher’s exact test was used.
Results: All item-level sample sizes were at least n=690. When comparing patients with Sjögren’s disease who reported testing positive to COVID-19 and those who did not, there were no significant differences in reported changes in weakness, fatigue, brain fog/cognitive impairment, anxiety/depression, and sleep problems (p = 0.253, 0.504, 0.753, 0.140, and 0.552, respectively). In each group, the issue most commonly reported to have worsened during the pandemic was fatigue (72.0% and 68.5% in the groups reporting and not reporting a positive COVID-19 test, respectively).
Conclusions: No evidence was found in the Sjögren’s disease population for differences in perceived mental health changes during the pandemic between those with and without a reported positive COVID-19 test. Both groups exhibited a high percentage of perceived increased fatigue since the start of the pandemic. Oral health care providers should consider communicating with their patients who have Sjögren’s disease about their level of fatigue and providing guidance when appropriate.