PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Gulen Hatemi
AU  - Peter A. Merkel
AU  - Vedat Hamuryudan
AU  - Maarten Boers
AU  - Haner Direskeneli
AU  - Sibel Z. Aydin
AU  - Hasan Yazici
TI  - Outcome Measures Used in Clinical Trials for Behçet Syndrome: A Systematic Review
AID  - 10.3899/jrheum.131249
DP  - 2014 Mar 01
TA  - The Journal of Rheumatology
PG  - 599--612
VI  - 41
IP  - 3
4099  - http://www.jrheum.org/content/41/3/599.short
4100  - http://www.jrheum.org/content/41/3/599.full
SO  - J Rheumatol2014 Mar 01; 41
AB  - Behçet syndrome (BS) is a multisystem vasculitis that is most active during young adulthood, causing serious disability and significant impairment in quality of life. Differences in the disease course, severity, and organ involvement between patients, depending on the age at presentation and sex, makes it impossible to determine a single management strategy. The diversity and variability in the outcome measures used in clinical trials in BS makes it difficult to compare the results or inform physicians about the best management strategy for individual patients. There is a large unmet need to determine or develop validated outcome measures for use in clinical trials in BS that are acceptable to researchers and regulatory agencies. We conducted a systematic review to describe the outcomes and outcome measures that have been used in clinical trials in BS. This review revealed the diversity and variability in the outcomes and outcome measures and the lack of standard definitions for most outcomes and rarity of validated outcome tools for disease assessment in BS. This systematic literature review will identify domains and candidate instruments for use in a Delphi exercise, the next step in the development of a core set of outcome measures that are properly validated and widely accepted by the collaboration of researchers from many different regions of the world and from different specialties, including rheumatology, ophthalmology, dermatology, gastroenterology, and neurology.