(3) The ACR response is a standard assessment used to measure patients' responses to anti-rheumatic therapies, devised by the American College of Rheumatology (ACR). It requires a patient to have a defined percentage reduction in a number of symptoms and measures of their disease. For example, a 20%, 50% or 70% level of reduction (the percentage of reduction of RA symptoms) is represented as ACR20, ACR50 or ACR70. An ACR70 response is exceptional for existing treatments and represents a significant improvement in a patient's condition.
(4) Disease activity is measured by a Disease Activity Score (DAS), where low disease activity is defined as DAS 28 less than or equal to 3.2 and remission is defined as DAS 28 less than or equal to 2.6
(5) Maini RN, Taylor PC, Szechinski J et al., on behalf of the CHARISMA Study Group. Double-blind randomised controlled clinical trial of the interleukin-6 receptor antagonist, tocilizumab, in European patients with rheumatoid arthritis who had an incomplete response to methotrexate. Arthritis Rheum. 2006 Sep;54(9):2817-29.
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