Search

Interventional radiology (IR) has evolved rapidly, but the clinical integration of interventional radiologists has not kept pace with technical advancements. This trial will address a gap in the literature by providing a robust investigation into specific measures for enhancing the clinical role of interventional radiologists, with potential implications for improving patient experiences and outcomes. The single-center randomized controlled trial will include 428 patients undergoing IR procedures. The control group will receive information about the procedure from the ordering physician, while the experimental group will have an additional consultation with an interventional radiologist and be shown procedure-specific explanatory videos. The primary outcomes are patients' knowledge, satisfaction with the information and communication, and anxiety. Data collection will involve specific questionnaires and scales. This trial is designed to investigate the importance of proactive clinical roles in patient care within IR. The study explores the potential of consultations and audiovisual tools, highlighting their role in educating patients about procedures. The results may help foster a more widespread acceptance of clinical responsibilities in IR and underscore the pivotal role of audiovisual aids in patient education and satisfaction. Trial registration: NCT05461482 at clinicaltrials.gov. Relevance statement: This randomized controlled trial will assess the impact of clinical consultations and explanatory audiovisual tools on patient understanding, satisfaction, and anxiety in interventional radiology. The findings could help establish a more proactive clinical role for interventional radiologists and improve the overall quality of patient-centered care. Key Points: We describe the protocol of an interventional radiology randomized clinical trial. The control group will receive procedure information from the referring physician and the experimental group receives additional consultation with interventionalists and views a video. Knowledge, satisfaction with information, and patient anxiety will be evaluated. This study will provide insights about the benefits of consultations and videos in interventional radiology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives The aim of our study was to identify the potential distinct phenotypes within a broad SpA population. Methods We conducted a cross-sectional study using the REGISPONSER registry, which has data from 31 specialist centres in Spain, including patients with SpA who have fulfilled the ESSG criteria. A latent class analysis (LCA) was performed to identify the latent classes underlying SpA according to a set of predefined clinical and radiographic features, independently of expert opinion. Results In a population of 2319 SpA patients, a five-classes LCA model yielded the best fit. Classes named 'Axial with spine involvement' and 'Axial with isolated SI joint involvement' showed a primarily axial SpA phenotype defined by inflammatory back pain and high HLA-B27 prevalence. Patients in class 'Axial + peripheral' showed a similar distribution of manifest variables to previous classes but also had a higher likelihood of peripheral involvement (peripheral arthritis/dactylitis) and enthesitis, therefore representing a mixed (axial and peripheral) subtype. Classes 'Peripheral + psoriasis' and 'Axial + peripheral + psoriasis' were indicative of peripheral SpA (and/or PsA) with high likelihood of psoriasis, peripheral involvement, dactylitis, nail disease, and low HLA-B27 prevalence, while class 'Axial + peripheral + psoriasis' also exhibited increased probability of axial involvement both clinically and radiologically. Conclusion The identification of five latent classes in the REGISPONSER registry with significant overlap between axial and peripheral phenotypes is concordant with a unifying concept of SpA. Psoriasis and related features (nail disease and dactylitis) influenced the phenotype of both axial and peripheral manifestations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Few studies have been conducted to investigate the socioeconomic profiles of patients with ankylosing spondylitis (AS) and their associations with disease severity and disability. Objectives: The objectives of this study were to identify clusters of patients with AS according to their socioeconomic characteristics and to evaluate the associations between these clusters and the severity of the disease and permanent disability. Design: This was a cross-sectional and multicentre study. Methods: Patients with AS from the REGISPONSER study were included in this analysis. A cluster analysis was conducted using information on sociodemographic (age, sex, race, marital status, education) and socioeconomic (employment, profession, housing conditions and social level) characteristics. Disease burden and permanent disability were compared between the different clusters using logistic regression adjusted for disease duration and disease activity. Results: A total of 866 patients with AS were included. Two clusters were identified according to socioeconomic characteristics: Cluster 1 (n = 476), with a predominantly low socioeconomic profile, and Cluster 2 (n = 390), with a predominantly high socioeconomic profile. After adjusting for disease duration, patients in Cluster 1 had a longer diagnosis delay, greater body mass index and greater structural damage than those in Cluster 2. Access to biologic disease-modifying anti-rheumatic drugs (bDMARDs) was similar for both groups. However, patients in Cluster 1 had a greater prevalence of permanent disability than those in Cluster 2 after adjusting for disease duration and disease activity (30.8% vs 13.2%, odds ratio 2.58 (95% confidence interval 1.76–3.83)). Conclusion: This study suggests that the socioeconomic status of patients with AS may have implications for disease severity and permanent disability, despite the similar use of bDMARDs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives To examine the prevalence of extra-musculoskeletal manifestations (EMM) and the association between diagnostic delay and their incidence in AS and PsA. Methods This was a retrospective, cohort study comprising two single centre cohorts in Europe and one multicentre cohort in Latin America (RESPONDIA). Crude prevalence of EMMs (uveitis, IBD and psoriasis) was calculated across geographic area and adjusted by direct standardization. Cox proportional hazard analysis was performed to assess the association between diagnostic delay and EMM incidence. Results Of 3553 patients, 2097 had AS and 1456 had PsA. The overall prevalence of uveitis was 22.9% (95% CI: 21.1, 24.8) in AS and 3.8% (95% CI: 2.9, 5.0) in PsA; 8.1% (95% CI: 7.0, 9.4) and 2.1% (1.3, 2.9), respectively, for IBD; and 11.0% (95% CI: 9.7, 12.4) and 94.6% (93.0, 95.9), respectively, for psoriasis. The EMM often presented before the arthritis (uveitis 45.1% and 33.3%, and IBD 37.4% and 70%, in AS and PsA, respectively). In the multivariable model, longer diagnostic delay (≥5 years) associated with more uveitis (hazard ratio [HR] 4.01; 95% CI: 3.23, 4.07) and IBD events (HR 1.85; 95% CI: 1.28, 2.67) in AS. Diagnostic delay was not significantly associated with uveitis (HR 1.57; 95% CI: 0.69, 3.59) or IBD events (HR 1.59; 95% CI: 0.39, 6.37) in PsA. Conclusion EMMs are more prevalent in AS than PsA and often present before the onset of the articular disease. A longer diagnostic delay is associated with the ' de novo ' appearance of uveitis and IBD in AS, highlighting the need to enhance diagnostic strategies to shorten the time from first symptom to diagnosis in SpA. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Brodalumab is a recombinant monoclonal antibody (IgG2) that binds with high affinity to the human interleukin‐17 (IL‐17) receptor A and blocks the biological activity of the proinflammatory cytokines IL‐17A, IL‐17F, IL‐17A/F heterodimer, and IL‐ 25, resulting in inhibition of inflammation and clinical symptoms associated with psoriasis. Its introduction has managed to increase the levels of efficacy, safety (improving that previously presented by the anti‐IL‐17 class), and survival. Material and methods: Retrospective analysis of a multicenter, observational study of real clinical practice including patients with moderate to severe plaque psoriasis in treatment with brodalumab. This cross‐sectional analysis includes information of patients between February 2019 and February 2022. A total of five tertiary hospitals in Andalusia (Spain) participated in this study. Analyses were performed "as observed" using GraphPad Prism version 8.3.0 for Windows. Results: Our study included 85 patients, 54 men (63.5%) and 31 women (36.5%), with moderate–severe psoriasis treated with brodalumab. In order to evaluate the efficacy of brodalumab, our patients started with mean Psoriasis Area and Severity Index (PASI) values of 12.8 and body surface area (BSA) of 16.9, as well as a Dermatology Life Quality Index (DLQI) of 15.6, highlighting that they reported that the mean baseline visual analog scale (VAS) pruritus was 6.15. On week 52, mean PASI reached 1.26 and mean BSA 2.3, showing a clear stabilization and even sustained improvement regarding results on week 12. Concerning the brodalumab survival, we obtained 85.8% persistence at week 52. Discussion: Brodalumab showed excellent results in the control of psoriasis in the mid‐term with an elevated number of patients maintaining treatment after 52 weeks. There were no statistically significant differences in the efficiency, safety, or survival results of brodalumab between patients coming from previous therapies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) have a significantly increased risk of sexual dysfunction. However, it is not properly included in commonly used questionnaires to assess health-related quality of life in RA. Qualisex is a questionnaire developed in France to assess the impact of RA on patients´ sexual function. Our aim was to adapt and validate this questionnaire for use with Spanish RA patients. Two independent translations and a backward translation were obtained. The final version was tested in a pilot study with 10 RA patients to detect any aspects that could hinder interpretation. The validity and reliability of the linguistically validated questionnaire were studied in a multicenter cross-sectional study, with a longitudinal component for reliability estimation. 125 RA patients were included. The response process, discrimination, internal consistency, internal structure, convergent validity (correlation with MGH-SFQ questionnaire, DAS-28, physician global assessment, patient global health assessment, RAID, HAQ, HADS and SF-12©) and reliability were analyzed. The inclusion of two extra items was proposed in the pilot study. The validity analysis detected responses for item 10 that were not coherent with responses for the rest of items. The Cronbach alpha coefficient was 0.971. The highest correlation (0.665) was obtained with MGH-SFQ (questionnaire measuring sexual functioning), followed by RAID (0.516). The intra-class correlation was 0.880 (95% CI 0.815; 0.923), higher than 0.85, which indicates excellent reliability. All parameters used to assess this questionnaire show highly acceptable values. Qualisex allows for a global score of RA patients' sexual functioning and can be self-administered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and lockdown may affect suicide risk and behavior. We compared suicide-related presentations during the national quarantine with pre-COVID data. This observational incidence study compared all suicide-related presentations at the University Hospital Reina Sofia emergency department (ED) in Cordoba, Spain, for the lockdown period from 15 March to 15 May 2020, with the same period in 2019. Descriptive and inferential analyses of case characteristics between 2019 and 2020 periods were conducted, and a multivariable logistic regression model developed. Results: Despite a decrease in overall ED cases during the lockdown, the number of suicide-related presentations stayed the same and represented a significantly larger proportion of cases in comparison to the pre-COVID period (0.42 vs. 0.87%, in 2019 and 2020, respectively; p <.001). The number presenting alone more than doubled during the COVID lockdown, increasing to 42.9% compared with 19.4% in 2019 (p =.002). An increase in presentations with a family history of suicide was also found. Conclusions: Suicide cases represented an increased proportion of ED cases during the lockdown. Presenting to ED alone, having a family history of suicide, habitual drug consumption, and hospital admission to ICU differentiated cases between pre and during COVID periods. These findings should be considered in light of the second wave and further implementation of lockdown measures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]