Research | ARMA

Fibromyalgia survey for healthcare professionals

Can you help us improve healthcare for people with fibromyalgia in the UK?

Professor Gary Macfarlane and Dr Rosemary Hollick of the PACFiND study team are looking for healthcare professionals who see patients with fibromyalgia to take part in a short online survey.

This survey will help PACFiND understand current provision of NHS services for people with fibromyalgia.

PACFiND (PAtient-centred Care for Fibromyalgia: New pathway Design) is a project aimed at developing new pathways of care for people with fibromyalgia.

Please click here to complete this survey.…

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Chronic Pain – This is how it feels

In October 2019 a report on chronic pain services and management from a patient and healthcare professional perspective was published. The research has highlighted a number of key insights and themes for how respondents felt that chronic pain services can be improved and made more equitable in the future. Pain is one of the common factors across all MSK conditions, so this is something which ARMA will be following up in the future.

This report describes the results of qualitative interviews with 23 patients and 20 healthcare professionals.…

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National Early Inflammatory Arthritis Audit first report

The National Early Inflammatory Arthritis Audit (NEIAA) collects information on all new patients over the age of sixteen seen in specialist rheumatology departments with suspected inflammatory arthritis in England and Wales. The first report was published in October. The audit assesses seven key metrics of care provided for people with new symptoms of arthritis attending rheumatology services for the first time and makes recommendations for services, educators and commissioners.

Some of the key findings include:

Secondary care units take an average of 28 days to achieve first assessment, compared to a target of three weeks.

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Research into reality – reporting on innovations

by Liz Lawrence, Head of Health Service Improvement, Versus Arthritis

Versus Arthritis has a rich research heritage and has funded some great research that has advanced practice including ESCAPE-pain or ‘Enabling Self-management and Coping with Arthritis Pain through Exercise’. This is a six-week rehabilitation programme for people aged 45+ with persistent hip and/or knee osteoarthritis. ESCAPE-pain involves group education and exercise delivered over twelve sessions. The ESCAPE-pain programme was originally developed by Professor Mike Hurley ^[1] with funding from Arthritis Research UK (now Versus Arthritis).…

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State of Musculoskeletal Health 2019

by Sophia Steinberger, Health Intelligence Analyst and Jonathan Canty, Policy Officer, Versus Arthritis

How many people have musculoskeletal conditions in the UK? How are these conditions affecting their lives? What is the breakdown by age, gender, and condition? What is the impact of MSK conditions on work, health services, and the wider economy?

This month Versus Arthritis published the annual State of Musculoskeletal Health 2019 to help answer these questions and many more. The report presents a collection of the best available data on the prevalence, risk factors, comorbidities, and impact of MSK conditions in the UK, to help further the understanding about the people living with and affected by these conditions.…

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Call on sex- and gender-related research projects in RMDs

The Foundation for Research in Rheumatology (FOREUM) launches a new study.

FOREUM considers studies on sex- and gender-related issues of key importance as they may help to better understand the pathogenesis of rheumatic musculoskeletal diseases as well as to better interpret peoples’ clinical presentation and disease course. The grant aims at instigating research, which improves our knowledge on the influence of gender on pathogenesis, clinical presentation and disease course of RMDs.

Letters of intent can be submitted until 10 September 2019.…

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Moving matters

Interventions to increase physical activity

We know that keeping active is important for maintaining MSK health. The challenge is always how to encourage people to be more active. This themed review from NIHR provides some evidence about what works (and what doesn’t).

The review outlines evidence from over 50 studies of what is effective in getting people more active. Evaluations range from programmes in schools and communities to changes in transport and the environment, which are designed to promote greater activity.…

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Mental health and persistent back and neck pain project

Designing care for people living with both mental health problems and persistent back and neck pain

by Jenna Collins, Marketing and Communications Manager, Q Labs, The Health Foundation

In September 2018, the Q Improvement Lab (part of the Health Foundation) and Mind embarked on a year-long collaboration to understand how care can be improved across mental health and persistent back and neck pain.

The Q Lab and Mind have recently shared the first insights from this work, drawing on the experiences of over 100 collaborators to give an overview of why this challenge warrants attention and promising opportunities to improve care.…

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Coventry University’s research survey

Last year, ARMA members helped Glykeria Skamagki, the senior lecturer in Physiotherapy at Coventry University, with the first stage of a study into chronic musculoskeletal conditions and their management at the workplace. The results were very interesting and now to follow-up the researchers are conducting a survey to identify the strategies that older employees use to manage chronic musculoskeletal conditions at the workplace.

The aim is to understand the problems highlighted at the interview stage, explore the opinion of the larger population, and ultimately to help people work better.…

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IMPACT-RMD study questionnaire

IMplementation of Physical Activity into routine Clinical pracTice in Rheumatic Musculoskeletal Disease

The IMPACT-RMD study aims to raise awareness on the importance of physical activity in people with Rheumatic and Musculoskeletal Diseases (RMDs). The goal is to help and support managing healthcare practitioners to understand more about physical activity as well as incorporate/include physical activity advice in clinical consultations.

Physical activity has multiple different benefits for RMDs, including better quality of life, better fitness and sleep, less fatigue and pain while it can also reduce inflammation.…

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