European multicentre pilot survey to assess vitamin D status in rheumatoid arthritis patients and early development of a new Patient Reported Outcome questionnaire (D-PRO).

What It Covers

Researchers studied Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc in the context of rheumatoid arthritis in this review publication.

To collect data on vitamin D (25(OH)D) serum levels in a large number of rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients from different European countries, to investigate their relation with disease activity, disability, quality of life, and possibly to construct a new Patient Reported Outcome (PRO) questionnaire in order to self-estimate if they are at risk for vitamin D insufficiency/deficiency-related clinical implications (D-PRO).

Who the Included Studies Covered

By PubMed's age tags, the people studied were adults and middle-aged adults, both men and women.

This was a European League Against Rheumatism (EULAR) supported cross-sectional study (project No CLI064) which involved 625 RA patients (mean age 55±11years, mean disease duration 11±9years), 276 age and sex matched healthy subjects, and rheumatologists working in academic institutions or hospital centres, as well as PARE organizations (patient representatives) from 13 European countries.

Serum samples for 25(OH)D level measurement were collected during winter time and analyzed in a central laboratory using chemiluminescence immunoassay (DiaSorin).

How the Review Was Done

Patient past medical history was recorded.

RA patients were provided with three questionnaires: the Rheumatoid Arthritis Impact Diseases score (RAID), the Health Assessment Questionnaire (HAQ), and the new D-PRO questionnaire at the time of 25(OH)D serum sampling.

D-PRO questionnaire consisted of three domains, Symptom Risk Score (SRS), Habitus Risk Score (HRS) and Global Risk Score (SRS+HRS=GRS), constructed with items possibly related to vitamin D deficiency.

D-PRO was correlated with both clinical and PRO scores.

Statistical analysis was performed by non parametric tests.

What Was Measured

PubMed files the paper under topics including Arthritis, Rheumatoid, Cross-Sectional Studies, Europe, Patient Reported Outcome Measures, Quality of Life, Surveys and Questionnaires and Vitamin D.

The authors tagged it with the keywords DAS28, Disability, Disease activity, HAQ, Patient Reported Outcome questionnaire and RAID.

What This Means in Plain Language

This is a review of Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc in people with rheumatoid arthritis.

The abstract goes on to report its results in about 5 sentences; this page does not restate them, so read the paper for the findings and their limits.

The publication is from 2017 (Autoimmunity reviews), a journal based in Netherlands.

More context: the Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc compound page, Rheumatoid arthritis research.