New insights into the measurement of disease activity in rheumatoid arthritis

Current Opinion in Rheumatology
D Aletaha

Abstract

Disease activity assessment in rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is a rapidly evolving field. Not only are new measures suggested or introduced in the field, but also we continuously learn about the better use of existing ones in the context of managing disease. On that background, we reviewed the literature on disease activity in RA of 2014 and selected interesting or relevant studies for further discussion. EULAR Management Criteria suggest that stringent disease activity targets should be used to guide treatment adaptation. Several studies support this, some even claim to change cutpoints for existing composite indices to match this stringency requirement, while others suggest seeking additional guidance by musculoskeletal ultrasound. One study suggests substantial modifications of existing composite measures in order to make them more objective, although the evident patient contribution to treatment decisions from another study would claim the opposite, namely to give more emphasis on the patient's perspective. New measures of disease activity include modification of core set parameters or existing MRI scores, but range up to currently less feasible whole-body MRI scans or sophisticated nuclear medicine methods. Here, we review sev...Continue Reading

References

Mar 11, 2010·Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases·Josef S SmolenUNKNOWN T2T Expert Committee
Mar 19, 2013·Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases·Burkhard MöllerUNKNOWN Swiss Clinical Quality Management Program for Rheumatic Diseases
Aug 9, 2013·Arthritis Care & Research·Liana Fraenkel, Meaghan Cunningham
Aug 21, 2013·Seminars in Hematology·Naseema Gangat, Alexandra P Wolanskyj
Nov 20, 2013·Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases·Duncan PorterNaveed Sattar
Jan 5, 2014·Clinical Rheumatology·Claire SheehyChetan Mukhtyar
Mar 7, 2014·Nuclear Medicine Communications·Socrates AngelidesNicholas Manolios
Mar 7, 2014·Clinical Rheumatology·Gábor FutóZoltán Szekanecz
May 14, 2014·Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases·Maria E C SandbergSaedis Saevarsdottir

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Citations

Nov 21, 2017·International Journal of Rheumatic Diseases·Ricardo Restrepo-CorreaCarlos J Velásquez-Franco
Jul 16, 2019·Rheumatology·Jon T EinarssonMeliha C Kapetanovic

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Methods Mentioned

BETA
imaging techniques

Software Mentioned

RAMRIS

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