Effect of therapy on the quality of life of patients with rheumatoid arthritis

Abstract

This study aims to investigate the quality of life and the factors that affect the quality of life, and to investigate the effects of medical therapeutic modalities used for the treatment of disease in patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA). Patients (55) who met the RA 1987 ACR criteria were enrolled. They were divided into two groups. One group received disease modifying anti-rheumatoid drugs (DMARD) therapy (n = 33) and the other group received anti-tumor necrosis factor (TNF) alpha therapy (n = 22). To evaluate disease activation and the quality of life, disease activity score 28 (DAS 28), Duruoz Hand Index (DHI), Stanford Health Assessment Questionnaire (HAQ), Rheumatoid Arthritis Quality of Life Questionnaire (RAQoL), Nottingham Health Profile (NHP), Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HDS), and Short Form-36 were used. Mean HAQ, RAQoL, and DHI scores were significantly higher in seropositive patients (p 0.05). In this study, when mean DAS 28 and VAS scores were examined in the groups treated with conventional therapy and anti-TNF alpha therapy, although the scores were lower in the a-ATG, the difference was not statistically significant.