Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Editorial
. 2006;8(1):102.
doi: 10.1186/ar1870.

Pooled indices to measure rheumatoid arthritis activity: a good reflection of the physician's mind?

Daniel Aletaha  1
Affiliations
Editorial

Pooled indices to measure rheumatoid arthritis activity: a good reflection of the physician's mind?

Daniel Aletaha. Arthritis Res Ther. 2006.

Abstract

Several pooled indices for the assessment of rheumatoid arthritis disease activity are available to rheumatologists. Face and criterion validity of these instruments can be assessed by determining the association of their measurements with opinions of physicians. Several confounding aspects must be considered in such analyses, especially blinding of the person(s) making the decisions to the instruments being studied and to the objective of the study in general. From several studies in the literature, there is currently no evidence that any one of the available composite indices is better or worse than any other. The choice of index in clinical practice should ideally be based on practical considerations related to the needs of the rheumatologist in the respective health care setting.

PubMed Disclaimer

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Performance of the SDAI and the DAS28. Receiver operating characteristic curve analysis of the performance of the SDAI and the DAS28, using expert opinion on patient profiles as the gold standard. The experts rated whether moderate or high disease activity was present or not. DAS28, Disease Activity Score based on 28-joint evaluation; SDAI, Simplified Disease Activity Index.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Comment in

Comment on

References

    1. Aletaha D, Smolen JS. The definition and measurement of disease modification in inflammatory rheumatic diseases. Rheum Dis Clin N Am. 2005. - PubMed
    1. Vander Cruyssen B, Van Looy S, Wyns B, Westhovens R, Durez P, Van den Bosch F, Veys EM, Mielants H, De Clerck L, Peretz A, et al. DAS28 best reflects the physician's clinical judgment of response to infliximab therapy in rheumatoid arthritis patients: validation of the DAS28 score in patients under infliximab treatment. Arthritis Res Ther. 2005;7:R1063–R1071. doi: 10.1186/ar1787. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. van der Heijde DM, van 't Hof MA, van Riel PL, Theunisse LA, Lubberts EW, van Leeuwen MA, van Rijswijk MH, van de Putte LB. Judging disease activity in clinical practice in rheumatoid arthritis: first step in the development of a disease activity score. Ann Rheum Dis. 1990;49:916–920. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Prevoo ML, van 't Hof MA, Kuper HH, van Leeuwen MA, van de Putte LB, van Riel PL. Modified disease activity scores that include twenty-eight-joint counts. Development and validation in a prospective longitudinal study of patients with rheumatoid arthritis. Arthritis Rheum. 1995;38:44–48. - PubMed
    1. Durez P, Van den Bosch F, Corluy L, Veys EM, De Clerck L, Peretz A, Malaise M, Devogelaer JP, Vastesaeger N, Geldhof A, et al. A dose adjustment in patients with rheumatoid arthritis not optimally responding to a standard dose of infliximab of 3 mg/kg every 8 weeks can be effective: a Belgian prospective study. Rheumatology (Oxford) 2005;44:465–468. doi: 10.1093/rheumatology/keh494. - DOI - PubMed