NRAS report on the impact of living with active RA but not being able to access advanced therapies

02 January 2021

In 2020, NRAS conducted a survey amongst its members and non-members who had RA with a disease duration more than 2 years, who were not on advanced therapies (i.e. biologic/biosimilar or targeted synthetic DMARDs (JAK inhibitors)), with the aim of revealing the everyday impact of living with RA in people not treated with advanced therapies. It aimed to assess in detail a wide range of aspects of quality of life and everyday living using the RA Impact of Disease (RAID) patient reported outcome questionnaire and other measures of the impact RA (on work).

Professor Patrick Kiely and Dr. Elena Nikiphorou undertook the analysis of the survey and were the main authors with NRAS in this paper, the key findings of which were:

• In established RA, patients who are not on advanced therapies, indicate high levels of suffering as reported by the RA Impact of Disease questionnaire (RAID)
• The RAID ‘patient acceptable state’ is very uncommon.
• High levels of pain, physical disability, sleep difficulties and fatigue are key symptoms experienced.

Authors: Elena Nikiphorou, Hannah Jacklin, Ailsa Bosworth, Clare Jacklin, Patrick Kiely