Results of the Health Assessment Questionnaire for Japanese patients with systemic sclerosis--measuring functional impairment in systemic sclerosis versus other connective tissue diseases.

Abstract

Patients with dSSc suffer greater functional impairment than patients with other connective tissue diseases, and improvements in hand use and walking represent very important targets for both drug development and rehabilitation. As improvement in organ involvement (joints, heart as well as pulmonary hypertension) can lead to reduced functional impairment, they constitute an important target for therapy in SSc.