Physician’s Global Assessment of Fingernail Psoriasis Found Valid

In a recent study, the Physician’s Global Assessment of Fingernail Psoriasis (PGA-F) was found to be both valid and reliable for use by rheumatologists treating patients with psoriatic arthritis (PsA).

Using 3 separate clinician cohorts, researchers analyzed PGA-F in 3 stages. The first cohort consisted of rheumatologists who provided qualitative data, which established that PGA-F had content validity, acceptability, utility, and feasibility when assessing nail severity. The second study cohort, of investigators in a phase 3 clinical study, and the third cohort of newly recruited rheumatologists, provided a quantitative analysis of PGA-F data. The final stage included known-groups validity.

According to the quantitative analyses, there was a consensus that the PGA-F security levels were comprehensive of real-work patient symptoms. The PGA-F was also found to be simple to use and understand. Psychometric analyses supported PGA-F as a clinical outcomes assessment tool.

The study authors concluded that “the PGA-F was shown to be usable by rheumatologists to measure patients along the full range of the fingernail psoriasis severity spectrum, have a strong relationship with a conceptually similar reference measure, differentiate among patients based on fingernail psoriasis severity, and detect category severity change over a 24-week period.”

—Allison Casey

Reference:
Hudgens S, Guigiu C, Guobyte A, et al. Validation of the Physician’s Global Assessment of Fingernail Psoriasis by rheumatologists treating psoriatic arthritis. Value Health. Published online May 25, 2022. DOI: 10.1016/j.jval.2022.04.1727