The Scottish Early Rheumatoid Arthritis (SERA) Study: an inception cohort and biobank

James Dale, Caron Paterson, Ann Tierney, Stuart H Ralston, David M Reid, Neil Basu, John Harvie, Neil D McKay, Sarah Saunders, Hilary Wilson, Robin Munro, Ruth Richmond, Derek Baxter, Michael McMahon, John McLaren, Vinod Kumar, Stefan Siebert, Iain McInnes, Duncan Porter

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Abstract

BACKGROUND: The Scottish Early Rheumatoid Arthritis (SERA) study is an inception cohort of rheumatoid (RA) and undifferentiated arthritis (UA) patients that aims to provide a contemporary description of phenotype and outcome and facilitate discovery of phenotypic and prognostic biomarkers METHODS: Demographic and clinical outcome data are collected from newly diagnosed RA/UA patients every 6 months from around Scotland. Health service utilization data is acquired from Information Services Division, NHS National Services Scotland. Plain radiographs of hands and feet are collected at baseline and 12 months. Additional samples of whole blood, plasma, serum and filtered urine are collected at baseline, 6 and 12 months RESULTS: Results are available for 1073 patients; at baseline, 76 % were classified as RA and 24 % as UA. Median time from onset to first review was 163 days (IQR97-323). Methotrexate was first-line DMARD for 75 % patients. Disease activity, functional ability and health-related quality of life improved significantly between baseline and 24 months, however the proportion in any employment fell (51 to 38 %, p = 0.0005). 24 % patients reported symptoms of anxiety and/or depression at baseline. 35/391 (9 %) patients exhibited rapid radiographic progression after 12 months. The SERA Biobank has accrued 60,612 samples CONCLUSIONS: In routine care, newly diagnosed RA/UA patients experience significant improvements in disease activity, functional ability and health-related quality of life but have high rates of psychiatric symptoms and declining employment rates. The co-existence of a multi-domain description of phenotype and a comprehensive biobank will facilitate multi-platform translational research to identify predictive markers of phenotype and prognosis.

Original languageEnglish
Article number461
JournalBMC Musculoskeletal Disorders
Volume17
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 9 Nov 2016

Bibliographical note

Acknowledgements
The study was conceived by the Scottish Collaborative Arthritis Research network, and data were collected by clinical research teams across Scotland. We would like to thank all the patients, clinical and nursing colleagues who have contributed their time and support to the study

Funding
The SERA study was jointly supported by the Chief Scientist’s Office Scotland (ETM-40) and Pfizer Ltd

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