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Current Use of Health Status Instruments in Randomised Controlled Trials on Patients with Rheumatoid Arthritis

  • Interventions & Outcomes
  • Published:
Disease Management and Health Outcomes

Summary

This review examines the current use of health status instruments, such as questionnaires, in randomised clinical trials in rheumatoid arthritis (RA). A computer-assisted literature search was done using information from January 1996 until May 1997. The articles included were reviewed in a standardised way according to the kind of study-design, type of intervention, treatment arms, study population, follow-up, use of outcome measures, use of the core set and of the response criteria, and the results.

44 trials were identified and, of these, 31 were included. Of the 31 efficacy studies on RA patients, 10 did not use health status instruments. The most frequently used health status instruments were the Arthritis Impact Measurement Scales (AIMS) and the Stanford Health Assessment Questionnaire (HAQ). Of 21 studies, 5 showed a between-group difference with respect to health status.

The main finding was that health status instruments are inconsistently used and lack full description and standardisation in their use as end-points in randomised clinical trials in RA.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Rheumatology and Physical Medicine, University Hospital Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland

    Jaap Fransen MSc & Gerold Stucki

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  1. Jaap Fransen MSc
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  2. Gerold Stucki
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Correspondence to Gerold Stucki.

Additional information

About the Authors: Gerold Stucki is an Associate Professor of Rheumatology and head of the institute for Physical Medicine at the University Hospital in Zurich.

Jaap Fransen, MSc, is a Research Fellow at the Institute of Physical Medicine at the University Hospital in Zurich.

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Fransen, J., Stucki, G. Current Use of Health Status Instruments in Randomised Controlled Trials on Patients with Rheumatoid Arthritis. Dis-Manage-Health-Outcomes 3, 271–277 (1998). https://doi.org/10.2165/00115677-199803060-00002

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.2165/00115677-199803060-00002

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