Treat-to-target from the patient perspective

The international treat-to-target initiative including rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients has defined remission or alternatively low disease activity as treatment goals. In Germany representatives of the medical profession, such as doctors, nurses and including the Deutsche Rheuma-Liga, are deliberating how to adapt and realize these goals in practice. The patient's perspective has to be taken into consideration as an outcome variable. Until now no combined patient reported outcome (PRO) score exists which is generally accepted by the scientific community and which puts the patient's perspective as the main primary outcome. Patients and doctors ought to decide jointly about the therapy goal remission/low disease activity and about other PROs and the planned strategy to achieve these goals. A precondition is that a sufficient timeframe is still available for this. The joint target of the medical profession and the Deutsche Rheuma-Liga is 1 rheumatologist per 50,000 adult inhabitants. An interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary treatment of RA patients is just as imperative as the expansion of patient training, information and self-management programs.