You are here

  • Home
  • Archive
  • Volume 64, Issue 5
  • Early referral recommendations for ankylosing spondylitis (including pre-radiographic and radiographic forms) in primary care

Article Text

Article menu
Download PDFPDF
Review
Early referral recommendations for ankylosing spondylitis (including pre-radiographic and radiographic forms) in primary care
  1. J Sieper,
  2. M Rudwaleit
  1. Medical Department I, Rheumatology, Campus Benjamin Franklin Charitè, University Medicine Berlin, Germany
  1. Correspondence to:
    Medical Department I
    Rheumatology, Charitè, University Medicine Berlin, Germany, Hindenburgdamm 30, 12200 Berlin, Germany; joachim.siepercharite.de

Abstract

An earlier diagnosis of ankylosing spondylitis (AS) is required because there is still a 5–7 year delay between first symptoms and diagnosis, and new effective treatments are available for active disease. Primary care physicians need easy to apply parameters to help them identify patients with suspected AS for onward referral. The best measures found were inflammatory back pain and HLA-B27 positivity.

  • AS, ankylosing spondylitis
  • CRP, C reactive protein
  • ESR, erythrocyte sedimentation rate
  • IBP, inflammatory back pain
  • LR, likelihood ratio
  • MRI, magnetic resonance imaging
  • NSAIDs, non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs
  • ankylosing spondylitis
  • screening
  • primary care

https://doi.org/10.1136/ard.2004.028753

Statistics from Altmetric.com

    Request Permissions

    If you wish to reuse any or all of this article please use the link below which will take you to the Copyright Clearance Center’s RightsLink service. You will be able to get a quick price and instant permission to reuse the content in many different ways.

    View Full Text

    Footnotes