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Indices documented similar improvement in patients with rheumatic diseases, osteoarthritis
Two indices and a physician global estimate documented similar baseline and 2-month improvement scores in patients diagnosed with a rheumatic disease or osteoarthritis, according to recent study results.
Researchers studied 141 patients (mean age, 59.2 years; 72% women) diagnosed with osteoarthritis (OA; n=41), rheumatoid arthritis (RA; n=39), systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE; n=14), spondyloarthropathy (SpA; n=23) or gout (n=24). At each visit, patients completed a Multidimensional Health Assessment Questionnaire (MDHAQ) and Routine Assessment of Patient Index Data (RAPID3; a composite of physical function, pain and patient global estimate [PATGL] measures) and were assigned a physician global estimate (DOCGL).
Patients’ mean and median physical function (FN; 0-10 scale), pain (0-10) and PATGL (0-10), RAPID3 (0-30) and DOCGL (0-10) scores were calculated at baseline and 2-month follow-up. Paired t tests analyzed differences between first visit and at 2 months for all diagnoses. Changes in mean values for each diagnosis also were compared using analysis of variance. Mean baseline scores across all measures showed narrow ranges: FN, 1.5-2.5, pain, 4.2-5.9; PATGL, 4.3-5.6; RAPID3, 10.1-13.7; and DOCGL, 2.4-4.
For all diagnoses except OA (0.6%), FN improvement ranged from 9.4% (gout) to 26.8% (SpA). In all diagnoses, ranges for pain improvement were 20.2% (SpA) to 35.3% (gout); PATGL, 11.3% (SpA) to 30.4% (RA); RAPID3, 16.8% (OA) to 27.5% (RA); and DOCGL, 23.8% (SpA) to 36.4% (OA).
“The data suggest that MDHAQ individual and RAPID3 scores may be informative in a large proportion of patients with many rheumatic diseases,” the researchers concluded. “The narrow range of mean MDHAQ/RAPID3 scores … is similar to the range of baseline and 2-month improvement according to physician global scores, suggesting face validity of the patient self-report data. These quantitative data may supplement traditional narrative, ‘gestalt’ descriptions in usual care of patients with any rheumatic disease.”