Background Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is a systemic autoimmune disease, characterised by chronic inflammatory changes. Pro inflammatory cytokines released in RA has a negative impact of cardiac health. Individuals with RA have shorter life expectancy and their risk of cardiovascular death is more than 50 % higher than that of the rest of the population. Early myocardial dysfunction in RA patients may be detectable sooner using speckle-tracking echocardiography.