The CARRA Consensus Treatment Plan (CTP) program was developed to learn more about the effects of different medications from studying patients who are receiving different therapies. In 2009, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) granted CARRA funds to initiate the development of CTPs with the ultimate aim of standardizing care in pediatric rheumatology in order to improve outcomes. Since that time, CARRA investigators have developed and published CTPs and pilot comparative effectiveness studies. For multiple diseases including polyarticular and systemic JIA, chronic uveitis, lupus nephritis, juvenile dermatomyositis, juvenile localized scleroderma, chronic recurrent multifocal osteomyelitis (CRMO), ANCA associated vasculitis, and periodic fever, aphthous stomatitis, pharyngitis adenitis (PFAPA) syndrome.
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CTPs Developed
Benefit of Standardizing Treatment
There are several benefits to utilizing CTPs in clinical care.
- Use of CTPs in clinical practice reduces treatment variability, thereby allowing for more accurate and reliable comparison of treatment effects when analyzing the observational data collected in the CARRA Registry.
- While CTPs are not practice guidelines, as practice guidelines require more prior research to support development, which is not available in pediatric rheumatology, CTPs describe several treatment options already currently in practice thus giving clinicians with less experience caring for children with rheumatic diseases, a reliable and consensus – driven resource to rely upon.
How Consensus Treatment Plans are Developed
- Literature review
- Case-based CARRA wide survey
- Consensus meeting
- CARRA wide survey
- Refinement and final voting
Read more about the development and revision process.
Read more about published CTPs and use of CTPs in comparative effectiveness research.
For questions, please contact [email protected].