Measures of symptoms and disease status in ankylosing spondylitis: Ankylosing Spondylitis Disease Activity Score (ASDAS), Ankylosing Spondylitis Quality of Life Scale (ASQoL), Bath Ankylosing Spondylitis Disease Activity Index (BASDAI), Bath Ankylosing Spondylitis Functional Index (BASFI), Bath Ankylosing Spondylitis Global Score (BAS‐G), Bath Ankylosing Spondylitis Metrology Index (BASMI), Dougados Functional Index (DFI), and Health Assessment Questionnaire for the Spondylarthropathies (HAQ‐S)

Outcome measurement in spondylarthritis, particularlyankylosing spondylitis (AS) has been a rapidly growingfield over the last decade, with enormous progress beingmade in patient-reported outcomes, clinical assessments,physical measurements and composite scoring of diseasestate, and response to treatment. Many of these advancesarose out of need, when antitumor necrosis factor therapieswere found to have a role in the treatment of ASpatients and therefore required appropriate clinical assessment.The Assessment of SpondyloArthritis internationalSociety (ASAS) was first formed in 1995 as a group ofclinicians and methodologists with a shared interest inoutcome measurement in AS patients, and has grown toincorporate early diagnosis, classification, developmentand validation of outcome measures, and evaluation oftherapeutic modalities.The instruments reviewed here include those recommendedin the ASAS core sets for clinical record keeping(in daily clinical practice) and for clinical research, as overtime these have been extensively validated and implementedacross different clinical settings. The core setsdescribe those health-related domains that should bemeasured in AS patients in different settings, and recommendappropriate instruments that can be used for thatdomain. Additional measures included are the AS Qualityof Life scale and the Health Assessment Questionnaire forthe Spondylarthropathies, which cover health domainsnot included in the original core sets but have been shownto be important to AS patients through the World HealthOrganization International Classification of Functioning,Disability and Health projects (1). Finally, the AS DiseaseActivity Score has also been presented, as an alternative tothe Bath Ankylosing Spondylitis Disease Activity Index,as one of the newest measures constructed to assess diseaseactivity.