AB1388-HPR TREATMENT ADHERENCE AMONG PATIENTS WITH INFLAMMATORY ARTHRITIDES TREATED WITH BDMARDS: AN OBSERVATIONAL STUDY USING I-CQR5 QUESTIONNAIRE AND THE ADMINISTRATIVE CLAIMS DATABASE

Background Effective treatments have been introduced for inflammatory arthritides (IAs) in the last decades. However, adherence remains suboptimal. Objectives The aim of the study was to assess treatment adherence among patients with IAs treated with bDMARDs in a community hospital with the Italian 5-item Compliance Questionnaire for Rheumatology (I-CQR5) [1] and the hospital administrative claims database. Methods We conducted a monocentric, cross-sectional, observational study in IA patients (disease duration >1 year, undergoing treatment with self-administered bDMARDs, capable to complete the questionnaire unaided) recruited in a community hospital from February to October 2018. Treatment adherence was defined according to I-CQR5 and to the Medication Possession Ratio (MPR) obtained from the claims database. To investigate variables associated with adherence, demographic, social, and clinical characteristics were considered. I-CQR5 has 5 questions, with Likert-answering scale ranging from 1 to 4, an algorithm allows to classify the patient as poorly or highly adherent (i.e. likely to take >=80% of their medications correctly) [1]. MPR was obtained by dividing the number of dosage units withdrawn by patients by the prescribed number of dosage units. Agreement between the I-CQR5 and MPR definition of high adherence definitions was tested with McNemars test, while the association with patients characteristics with chi-square or Fishers exact test. Results A total 174 patients completed the I-CQR5 (median age 60 years, range 51-67; 37% males), affected by ankylosing spondylitis (16%), rheumatoid arthritis (RA) (62%), psoriatic arthritis (22%) with a median duration of 15 years (range 10-20). Etanercept (49%), adalimumab (20%), abatacept (8%) and tocilizumab (7.5%) were the most prescribed first-line biologics. Association with a conventional synthetic DMARDs was prescribed to 3.4% of subjects. High adherence rate, assessed with I-CQR5, was 83% overall, and 85% in RA patients. Significant differences were observed between highly and poorly adherent patients according to I-CQR5: lower educational status (lower primary or secondary school, and the use of cDMARDs were associated with poor adherence (both with p Conclusion The study showed that IA patients treated with bDMARDs with a higher educational level are more adherent to physician prescription, as assessed by I-CQR5. I-CQR5 might overestimate adherence compared to MPR. In our study, the high adherence rate measured with I-CQR5 was higher compared with a report from a large outpatient clinic in the same area, which was limited to RA patients (85% vs 40,1%) [1] Our study may suggest that adherence benefits more from a close and stable relationship with the health care practitioner, such as in our centre, which is smaller than large outpatients clinics in which patients are followed by a health care professionals equipe rather than a single physician. References [1] Ometto F, et al. Ann Rheum Dis 2018;77(Suppl): A1322. Disclosure of Interests None declared