EARLY DETECTION OF POOR ADHERENCE TO TREATMENT OF PEDIATRIC RHEUMATIC DISEASES: PEDIATRIC RHEUMATOLOGY ADHERENCE QUESTIONNAIRE - A PILOT STUDY

ABSTRACT Objective: To develop a questionnaire that allows the early detection of patients at risk for poor adherence to medical and non-medical treatment in children and adolescents with chronic rheumatic diseases. Methods: The Pediatric Rheumatology Adherence Questionnaire (PRAQ) was applied in recently diagnosed patients within a period of one to four months after confirmation of the rheumatic disease. After six months, the patients’ adherence to the medical and non-medical treatment was assessed. An internal consistency analysis was conducted to eliminate redundant questions in the PRAQ. Results: A total of 33 patients were included in the pilot study. Six months after the PRAQ had been applied, poor global adherence was observed in seven (21.2%) patients and poor adherence to medical treatment in eight (24.2%) patients. No correlation was observed between the PRAQ scores and the percentages of adherence, as well as the stratification for each index, except for a tendency to a correlation between socioeconomic index and poor adherence to medical treatment (p=0.08). A new PRAQ questionnaire with 25 of the 46 original questions was generated as a result of the reliability analysis. Conclusions: The usefulness of this questionnaire in clinical practice should be still evaluated. Due to the importance of a tool for the early detection of rheumatic patients at risk of poor adherence to treatment, the new PRAQ questionnaire should be reviewed and applied in a larger study to better define its validity and reliability.