for Rheumatoid Arthritis is a minimum set of valid disease activity variables that are recommended to be used in clinical trials, to determine if a new treatment works. It consists of the following criteria:
Pain
Tender joints
Swollen joints
Function
Patient’s opinion
Clinician’s opinion
X-rays
This core-set was defined during the first OMERACT conferences and authorized by the ACR (published in 1993) as well as the WHO and ILAR (published in 1994). Both translated the OMERACT RA core set into different response criteria (criteria for improvement).
During OMERACT 6 patients stated that fatigue and sleep disturbance are important outcomes which had not been integrated in the RA core set.
More information about the ACR-criteria and EULAR-Criteria, see: Anke M. van Gestel et al. “ACR and EULAR improvement criteria have comparable validity in RA trials”, J. Rheumatol 1999;26:3:705-711.
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