The modified Rodnan skin score (mRSS) is a measure of skin thickness and is used as a primary or secondary outcome measure in clinical trials of systemic sclerosis (scleroderma). This state-of-art review provides a historical perspective of the development of the mRSS, summarizes the performance of mRSS as an outcome measure, provides guidance on assessing mRSS, and makes recommendations for in...

Auditory perceptual training affects neural plasticity and so represents a potential strategy for tinnitus management. We assessed the effects of auditory perceptual training on tinnitus perception and/or its intrusiveness via a systematic review of published literature. An electronic database search using the keywords 'tinnitus and learning' or 'tinnitus and training' was conducted, updated by...

Attention to the pain that occurs during treatments and procedures for pediatric patients with cancer continues to be a priority. This article describes the development of a pain effectiveness outcome measure at an academic pediatric medical center in order to inform about the implementation of quality improvement strategies and evaluate the effect of these pain interventions within the hospita...

OBJECTIVE To assess the reading levels required to complete patient-reported outcome measures (PROs) commonly used in rheumatology clinical and research settings. METHODS Ten PROs written in English were evaluated. Four reviewers critiqued each measure blindly using two standardized readability indexes and a final readability score for each PRO was agreed. RESULTS Only six of the PROs met t...

CONTEXT Medical educational reform includes enhancing role modelling of clinical teachers. This requires faculty being aware of their role model status and performance. We developed the System for Evaluation of Teaching Qualities (SETQ) to generate individualized feedback on previously defined teaching qualities and role model status for faculty in (non) academic hospitals. OBJECTIVES (i) To ...

The purpose of the Materials and Methods section of a scientific manuscript is to provide information in sufficient detail, so that another scientist working in the same field of endeavor is able to repeat the experiments and reproduce the results. Authors are entitled to a justified decision on the publication or not of their work. Thus, reviewers need to assure the authors that they have stud...

In the 38 years that have elapsed since Virginia Apgar described a scoring system for the assessment of the condition of infants at birth, the Apgar score has achieved legendary status as the 'gold standard' outcome measure for countless studies. In light of modem perinatal practice, it is important to assess the value of the score does it still measure what it originally intended to? Is the sc...

Over the past decade, the assessment of the disease activity in psoriatic arthritis (PsA) has rapidly evolved in view of the need for valid, feasible, and reliable outcome measures that can be ideally employed in longitudinal cohorts, clinical trials, and clinical practice as well as the growing paradigm of tight disease control and treating to target in the management of PsA. This paper review...

BACKGROUND Lead poisoning is associated with physical, cognitive and neurobehavioral impairment in children and many household interventions to prevent lead exposure have been trialled. OBJECTIVES To determine the effectiveness of household interventions in preventing or reducing lead exposure in children as measured by reductions in blood lead levels and/or improvements in cognitive developm...

INTRODUCTION Assistive technology is often recommended with the aim of increasing user independence and reducing the burden on informal caregivers. However, until now, there has been no tool to measure the outcomes of this process for caregivers. OBJECTIVES To describe the development of the Caregiver Assistive Technology Outcome Measure (CATOM), a tool developed to measure the impact of assi...