Gartnavel General Hospital, 1053 Great Western Road, Glasgow G12 0YN, UK
SIR, There is an important error in the article by Bingham and Emery [1], and I would urge the journal to print a correction at the earliest opportunity. The authors report using the Disease Activity Score (DAS) to assess response to DMARDs. They state that they use the modified DAS that uses 28 joint counts (DAS28); their Table 2 gives the correct formula for calculating the DAS28, but gives the response criteria for use with the original DAS (44 joint swelling count and Ritchie articular index). These counts are not inter-changeable, and have different response definitions [2]. The correct definitions of response, using the DAS28 are shown in Table 1.
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Accepted 17 March 2000
References
Rheumatology and Rehabilitation Research Unit, School of Medicine, University of Leeds, 36 Clarendon Road, Leeds LS2 9JT, UK
We would like to thank Dr Porter for his comments regarding the use of the DAS28 score and calculation of the EULAR response [1]. Inadvertently the incorrect table was published. We can assure Dr Porter that patients have not been over-treated as we use computer software that accurately calculates the DAS and EULAR response. The difficulties of using complex scores are illustrated by the fact that even Dr Porter's corrected table as originally submitted was incorrect in detail (< and > used instead of or
).
Notes
Correspondence to: S. Bingham.
References