Curr Med Res Opin. 2025 Jun 9:1-16. doi: 10.1080/03007995.2025.2516147. Online ahead of print.
ABSTRACT
Objective: Quantification of myasthenia gravis (MG) symptom severity and treatment satisfaction could differ whether reported by patients or physicians. The study objective was to explore concordance between assessments of symptom severity, symptom troublesomeness, and treatment satisfaction by patients with myasthenia gravis (MG) and their physicians.Methods: Data were from the Adelphi Real World MG Disease Specific Programme (DSP), a multinational (France, Germany, Italy, Spain, United Kingdom [UK], United States [US]), cross-sectional survey with retrospective chart review independently completed by physicians and their patients in 2020.Results: Across all patients and all symptoms, physician-patient concordance about symptom severity was moderate (Cohen’s Weighted Kappa [κ] statistic = 0.45). However, there was high variability, and when each of the 17 symptoms was examined individually, agreement was slight or fair (κ = 0.00-0.40). The proportion of physicians describing a given symptom as less severe than the patient ranged from 30.9-74.5%. There were many instances where a physician reported a symptom as absent, but the patient self-reported it as present (e.g. fatigue/tiredness: physician-reported absence in 42% of patients [of whom 11% self-reported mild, 17% moderate, 5% severe], muscle ache after activity: physician-reported absence in 58% of patients [of whom 12% self-reported mild, 10% moderate, 6% severe]. There was generally greater physician-patient concordance in recognizing patients’ most troublesome symptoms; agreement was poor (κ < 0) or slight/fair (κ = 0.00-0.40) for 6 symptoms and moderate/substantial (κ = 0.41-0.80) for 11. Physician-patient concordance regarding treatment satisfaction was fair (κ = 0.37), with physicians reporting higher satisfaction than patients in 36.6% of cases.Conclusions: Although some degree of physician-patient concordance was observed, there remained many patients reporting greater symptom severity and/or lower treatment satisfaction compared with physicians.
PMID:40485493 | DOI:10.1080/03007995.2025.2516147
