Sentinel joint scoring in rheumatoid arthritis: an individualized power Doppler assessment strategy.

OBJECTIVE: Musculoskeletal ultrasound quantifies the total synovial inflammatory burden in rheumatoid arthritis (RA) but is time consuming when scanning numerous joints. This study evaluated a novel patient-centered method for constructing a longitudinal ultrasound score in RA patients. METHODS: Fifty-four RA patients starting intravenous tocilizumab were evaluated with power Doppler ultrasound (PDUS) of 34 joints and DAS28-ESR was assessed at baseline and weeks 4, 12, 16, and 24. The sentinel joint score (SJS) was derived from the reduced subset of joints with PDUS ≥ 1 at baseline. Total PDUS (tPDUS) score and US7 were also calculated. Changes in tPDUS and SJS were correlated. Effect sizes were calculated for tPDUS, SJS, and US7. The proportion of "flipped" joints without baseline PDUS signal that later developed PDUS signal was estimated. RESULTS: At baseline, 1236/1829 joints scanned (67.5%) did not have PDUS signal. The proportion of "flipped" joints at 24 weeks was 5.6% for ≥ 1, 2.9% for ≥ 2, and 1.0% for = 3 PD. tPDUS and SJS scores were highly correlated (r = 0.91 to 0.97). Overall the effect sizes for tPDUS, SJS, and US7 increased over 24 weeks, where SJS was the highest (SJS 1.00 4-week, 1.07 12-week, 1.26 24-week) and tPDUS and US7 were comparable (tPDUS 0.32 4-week, 0.52 12-week, 0.84 24-week; US7 0.23 4-week, 0.52 12-week, 0.74 24-week). CONCLUSION: In RA patients starting a biologic, scanning only joints with baseline PDUS signal can substantially reduce the number of joints requiring follow-up scanning by 67.5% and improves feasibility. "Flipped" joints are infrequently seen after starting therapy. TRIAL REGISTRATION: ClinicalTrials.gov NCT01717859 Key messages • Only a small percent of joints develop power Doppler signal after baseline scanning. • Changes in the SJS correlate well with changes in clinical activity measured by DAS28-ESR over time. • The SJS effect size is higher than total PDUS and US7 scores, and may improve examination feasibility.

Preoperative Ultrasound Assessment of Regional Lymph Nodes in Melanoma Patients Does not Provide Reliable Nodal Staging: Results From a Large Multicenter Trial.

OBJECTIVE: To assess whether preoperative ultrasound (US) assessment of regional lymph nodes in patients who present with primary cutaneous melanoma provides accurate staging. BACKGROUND: It has been suggested that preoperative US could avoid the need for sentinel node (SN) biopsy, but in most single-institution reports, the sensitivity of preoperative US has been low. METHODS: Preoperative US data and SNB results were analyzed for patients enrolled at 20 centers participating in the screening phase of the second Multicenter Selective Lymphadenectomy Trial. Excised SNs were histopathologically assessed and considered positive if any melanoma was seen. RESULTS: SNs were identified and removed from 2859 patients who had preoperative US evaluation. Among those patients, 548 had SN metastases. US was positive (abnormal) in 87 patients (3.0%). Among SN-positive patients, 39 (7.1%) had an abnormal US. When analyzed by lymph node basin, 3302 basins were evaluated, and 38 were true positive (1.2%). By basin, the sensitivity of US was 6.6% (95% confidence interval: 4.6-8.7) and the specificity 98.0% (95% CI: 97.5-98.5). Median cross-sectional area of all SN metastases was 0.13 mm2; in US true-positive nodes, it was 6.8 mm2. US sensitivity increased with increasing Breslow thickness of the primary melanoma (0% for ≤1 mm thickness, 11.9% for >4 mm thickness). US sensitivity was not significantly greater with higher trial center volume or with pre-US lymphoscintigraphy. CONCLUSION: In the MSLT-II screening phase population, SN tumor volume was usually too small to be reliably detected by US. For accurate nodal staging to guide the management of melanoma patients, US is not an effective substitute for SN biopsy.

Perioperative respiratory adverse event risk assessment in children with upper respiratory tract infection: Validation of the COLDS score.

BACKGROUND: The decision to proceed with anesthesia and surgery has been controversial in pediatric patients with an upper respiratory tract infection. The COLDS score was proposed by Lee and August as a potential risk stratification scheme, but no validation has been performed on this scale. AIMS: The aim of this study was to evaluate the utility of the COLDS score in predicting perioperative respiratory adverse events and optimize its predictive ability. METHODS: COLDS scores, incidence of perioperative respiratory adverse events, surgical procedure type, and age were prospectively collected for 536 patients who met inclusion criteria. Area under the receiver operating characteristic curves was computed for total COLDS score and individual COLDS score categories. Multivariable regression was used create an optimized score. To quantify the decrease in risk associated with case cancelation due to illness, the other risk factors in COLDS were assessed separately from upper respiratory infection status and a risk model was created. RESULTS: The area under the receiver operating characteristic curve for the total COLDS score was 0.69, suggesting that the COLDS score has a moderate predictive ability for perioperative respiratory adverse events. When split into individual component scores, the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve ranged from 0.55 to 0.63. We also found that the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve for the scoring system was higher in younger children than for children aged 4-6 (area under receiver operating characteristic curve of 0.70-0.71 vs 0.66). The area under the receiver operating characteristic curve for the optimized scoring system was 0.71. CONCLUSION: The COLDS score has the potential to be a valuable risk assessment tool for prediction of perioperative respiratory adverse events and appears to have a better predictive value in certain subpopulations.

Joint-specific assessment of swelling and power Doppler in obese rheumatoid arthritis patients.

BACKGROUND: Clinical swollen joint examination of the obese rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patient can be difficult. Musculoskeletal Ultrasound (MSUS) has higher sensitivity than physical examination for swollen joints (SJ). The purpose of this study was to determine the joint-specific association between power Doppler (PDUS) and clinical SJ in RA across body mass index (BMI) categories. METHODS: Cross-sectional clinical and laboratory data were collected on 43 RA patients. PDUS was performed on 9 joints (wrist, metacarpalphalangeal 2-5, proximal interphalgeal 2/3 and metatarsalphalangeal 2/5). DAS28 and clinical disease activity index (CDAI) were calculated. Patients were categorized by BMI: <25, 25-30, and >30. Demographic and clinical characteristics were compared across BMI groups with Kruskal-Wallis test and chi-square tests. Joint-level associations between PDUS and clinically SJ were evaluated with mixed effects logistic regression models. RESULTS: While demographics and clinically-determined disease activity were similar among BMI groups, PDUS scores significantly differed (p = 0.02). Using PDUS activity as the reference standard for synovitis and clinically SJ as the test, the positive predictive value of SJ was significantly lower in higher BMI groups (0.71 in BMI < 25, 0.58 in BMI 25-30 and 0.44 in BMI < 30) (p = 0.02). The logistic model demonstrated that increased BMI category resulted in decreased likelihood of PDUS positivity (OR 0.52, p = 0.03). CONCLUSIONS: This study suggests that in an obese RA patient, a clinically assessed SJ is less likely to represent true synovitis (as measured by PDUS). Disease activity in obese RA patients may be overestimated by CDAI/DAS28 calculations and clinicians when considering change in therapy.

Regional distribution of adult rheumatologists.

OBJECTIVE: To analyze the distribution of rheumatology practices in the US and factors associated with that distribution, in order to better understand the supply of the rheumatology workforce. METHODS: Using the American College of Rheumatology membership database, all practicing adult rheumatologist office addresses were mapped with ArcView software. The number of rheumatologists per Core Based Statistical Area (CBSA) was calculated. To investigate whether sociodemographic factors correlated with clustering of rheumatologists, covariates from the 2010 US Census for each CBSA, including age, sex, race/ethnicity, and median household income, were modeled. RESULTS: Many CBSAs, predominantly smaller micropolitan areas, did not have a practicing rheumatologist. For some of these smaller micropolitan areas (with populations of at least 40,000), the closest practicing rheumatologist was more than 200 miles away. However, we also identified several more-populous areas (populations of 200,000 or more) without a practicing rheumatologist. Greater numbers of rheumatologists were more likely to practice in areas with higher population densities and higher median incomes. More rheumatologists were also found in CBSAs in which there were rheumatology training programs. CONCLUSION: These findings demonstrate that many smaller regions of the country have no or few practicing adult rheumatologists. Patients with chronic rheumatic conditions in these areas likely have limited access to rheumatology care. Policy changes could address potential regional rheumatology workforce shortages, but limitations of the current data would need to be addressed prior to implementation of such changes.

A hierarchical zero-inflated log-normal model for skewed responses.

Although considerable attention has been given to zero-inflated count data, research on zero-inflated lognormal data is limited. In this article, we consider a study to examine human sperm cell DNA damage obtained from single-cell electrophoresis (COMET assay) experiment in which the outcome measures present a typical example of log-normal data with excess zeros. The problem is further complicated by the fact that each study subject has multiple outcomes at each of up to three visits separated by six-week intervals. Previous methods for zero-inflated log-normal data are based on either simple experimental designs, where comparison of means of zero-inflated log-normal data across different experiment groups is of primary interest, or longitudinal measurements, where only one observation is available for each subject at each visit. Their methods cannot be applied when multiple observations per visit are possible and both inter- and intra-subject variations are present. Our zero-inflated model extends the previous methods by incorporating a hierarchical structure using latent random variables to take into account both inter- and intra-subject variations in zero-inflated log-normal data. An EM algorithm has been developed to obtain the Maximum likelihood estimates of the parameters and their standard errors can be estimated by parametric bootstrap. The model is illustrated using the COMET assay data.