Every patient suffering from active rheumatoid arthritis should be treated with disease-modifying antirheumatic drugs (DMARD) but methotrexate initially remains the first choice treatment. Treatment should comply with the treat-to-target principle. The therapeutic aim is remission if attainable or at least a low disease activity. Remission is defined as a simplified disease activity score index (SDAI) of ≤3.3 or as fulfilling the so-called Boolean criteria. A first evaluation of the response is due after 12 weeks. At this time there should be a measurable response defined as an improvement of at least 50% of the composite score, e.g. the DAS28. If no improvement has been achieved, treatment should be continued with either a second DMARD strategy conventionally with synthetic DMARDs (csDMARDs) or an alternative with biological (bDMARD) or targeted synthetic (tsDMARDs) DMARD, depending on whether there are risk factors for a severe disease progression. A change within bDMARDs and tsDMARDs as well as therapeutic de-escalation are both possible measures in the further course of treatment.
Keywords: Disease-modifying antirheumatic drugs; Methotrexate; Outcome; Remission; Treat to target.