Autoimmune disease linked to greater dengue severity in Colombian cohort

The study included 171 participants whose outcomes were assessed over 2014–2024: 57 had autoimmune diseases and 114 did not. Severe dengue occurred in 7.0% of the autoimmune-disease group, compared with 2.6% of the comparison group. After adjustment for potential confounders, the association between autoimmune disease and dengue severity was estimated at an odds ratio of 2.14, with a 95% confidence interval of 1.08–4.41 and p = 0.030.

The researchers compared demographic, clinical and outcome measures between the two groups and examined laboratory-test trends before, during and after infection. Women represented 87.7% of the sample, and the median age was 48 years. Among participants with autoimmune diseases, rheumatoid arthritis was the most frequent diagnosis at 42%, followed by systemic lupus erythematosus at 29.8% and Sjögren’s syndrome at 19.3%.

Patients with autoimmune diseases more often presented with dengue warning signs: these were reported in 66.7% of the autoimmune-disease group and 55.4% of the group without autoimmune diseases. The study also found a higher proportion reporting a previous dengue infection in the autoimmune-disease group, at 49.1% compared with 43.0%. Hospitalization was more frequent among participants with autoimmune disease, at 68.4% versus 61.4%, but that difference was not statistically significant, with p = 0.368.

Intensive-care admission was also numerically higher in the autoimmune-disease group, at 12.3% versus 5.3%, although the difference did not reach statistical significance, with p = 0.125. Participants with autoimmune diseases had longer hospital stays, but the supplied research summary does not report the numerical durations. For the severity analysis, the investigators calculated crude and adjusted odds ratios with 95% confidence intervals to identify factors associated with dengue severity.

They also performed sensitivity analyses, interaction testing and bootstrap validation, and reported that the findings were consistent across the adjusted, sensitivity and bootstrap analyses. The authors described this consistency as support for the robustness of the association within the dataset. Dengue is an acute viral illness transmitted by the mosquitoes Aedes aegypti and Aedes albopictus and is prevalent in tropical and subtropical regions.

Although most infections are asymptomatic, severe disease can develop, particularly in people with risk factors. The researchers noted that the clinical course of dengue had been studied less extensively in patients with autoimmune diseases and that no prior research on this question had been conducted in Colombia. Larger prospective multicenter studies were needed to confirm the association and clarify its immunopathogenic basis.

Subject of Research: Association between autoimmune disease and severe dengue in a Colombian referral-center cohort

Article Title: Dengue in patients with immune-mediated diseases: clinical outcomes at a referral center in Southwest Colombia

Article References: Hormaza-Jaramillo, A. A., Rosso-Suarez, F., Hurtado-Bermudez, L. J., Vargas-Potes, C. J., Garces-Baena, M., Lopez-Garcia, S., & Plata-Cano, I. F. (2026). Dengue in patients with immune-mediated diseases: clinical outcomes at a referral center in Southwest Colombia. BMC Infectious Diseases. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12879-026-14350-y

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: 10.1186/s12879-026-14350-y

Keywords: dengue, autoimmune diseases, severe dengue, Colombia, retrospective cohort, infectious disease, clinical outcomes, risk association, patients, immune-mediated, diseases, clinical