Work productivity in rhinitis using cell phones: The MASK pilot study

In the European Union (EU), between 44 and 76 million individuals of the 217 million EU employees suffer from allergic disease of the airways or the skin. Up to 90% of these persons are untreated or insufficiently treated. This has major socio-economic consequences such as absence from work (absenteeism), particularly reduced productivity at work (presenteeism).

Backround Visual analogue scales (VAS) are psychometric measuring instruments designed to document the characteristics of disease-related symptom severity in individual patients and use this to achieve a rapid (statistically measurable and reproducible) classification of symptom severity and disease control. VAS can also be used in routine patient history taking and to monitor the course of a chronic disease such as allergic rhinitis (AR). More specifically, the VAS has been used to assess effectiveness of AR therapy in real life, both in intermittent and persistent disease. Methods This position paper takes a detailed look at the historical development of VAS and its method-specific principles. Particular focus is put on aspects of practical application in daily routine and on a critical discussion of the advantages and disadvantages of the individual methods. Results VAS are well validated for the measurement of AR symptoms and correlate well with the ARIA (allergic rhinitis and its impact on asthma) severity classification and also correlated well with rTNSS and RQLQ. Moreover, several treatment studies on AR have used VAS as an evaluation parameter. Thanks to the use of new (real-life and real-time) communication technologies, such as smartphone apps, Discussion: VAS can be used relatively simply and highly effectively to assess disease control. The VAS lends itself very well to digitization and has now been incorporated into a smartphone app (called Allergy Diary) to assess AR control and direct treatment decisions as part of an AR clinical decision support system (CDSS). MASK Rhinitis has developed this app, which is currently available in 15 different languages.

The EQ-5D questionnaire is an instrument for describing and valuing health states. To compare general population health status measured by the EQ-5D in 6 European countries. In the European Study of the Epidemiology of Mental Disorders representative population samples in Belgium (n = 2411), France (n = 2892), Germany (n = 3552), Italy (n = 4709), the Netherlands (n = 2367), and Spain (n = 5473) completed the EQ-5D as part of personal computer-based home interviews in 2001 to 2003. Of all respondents, 35.1% reported problems in one or more EQ-5D dimensions, most frequently pain/discomfort (28.5%), followed by mobility (13.6%), usual activities (10.5%), anxiety/depression (8.0%), and self-care (3.6%). Proportions of respondents reporting any problems differed significantly between countries, ranging from 26.6% in Spain to 44.5% in France. Mean EQ VAS score was 77.1, ranging from 75.0 in Spain to 82.0 in the Netherlands. After adjusting for sociodemographic variables, the proportion of respondents reporting problems in any of the EQ-5D dimensions was significantly higher in France and lower in Spain and Italy than the grand mean. Even after controlling for reported EQ-5D health states, mean EQ VAS scores were significantly higher in the Netherlands and lower in Spain than the grand mean. Age, female gender, low educational level, lack of paid employment, and low income were associated with more problems in most of the EQ-5D dimensions and lower EQ VAS scores. Self-reported EQ-5D health status differed considerably between countries, calling for caution when making international comparisons of disease burden and health care effectiveness.