Abstract
A number of clinical and laboratory methods have been developed to measure both the disease activity and severity of inflammatory arthritis patients. The most frequently used clinical measure to assess arthritis activity is joint counts (counting the number of swollen and tender joints, usually in 28 pre-specified joints). These are often combined with other clinical and laboratory measures in a composite score called the disease activity score on a 28-joint count (DAS28). Many measures of assessing inflammatory arthritis severity exist. In clinical practice the commonest methods include X-ray and ultrasound imaging, which capture joint damage and inflammation, and the health assessment questionnaire (HAQ), which provides information on function and disability. This chapter will provide a comprehensive overview of the methods used to assess the activity and severity of patients with an inflammatory arthritis.
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Scott, I.C., Galloway, J.B., Scott, D.L. (2015). Clinical and Laboratory Assessments. In: Inflammatory Arthritis in Clinical Practice. Springer, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4471-6648-1_4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4471-6648-1_4
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