A STRUCTURED TRAINING PROGRAM FOR PATIENTS WITH RHEUMATOID ARTHRITIS TO SELF-MONITOR DISEASE ACTIVITY

Objective. To develop a structured training program for patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) to self-monitor disease activity and to assess effectiveness of this program.Material and Methods. The study included 60 patients with definite diagnosis of RA according to the ACR/EULAR 2010 diagnostic criteria (52 females and 8 males, mean age 58.8 ± 10.4 years, the median duration of RA was 5 [2.75; 12] years). Patients were trained using the original method Structured Program of Training Patients with RA to Self-Monitor Disease Activity during the first visit and one month later (second visit). Skill acquisition was controlled by estimating the number of painful (NPJ) and swollen (NSJ) joints in parallel by a physician and the patient during the second visit and 2 months after the first visit (the third visit). Statistical significance was analyzed using the McNemar’s test (differences are considered to be significant when p