Multidimensional Evaluation of Pain in Rheumatoid Arthritis (Douleur PR)

Rheumatoid Arthritis (RA) is an inflammatory chronic rheumatism where the pain remains the priority domain of improvement for the patients instead a good control of the inflammatory disease by treatments, even biotherapeutics .

Some studies show that less than 50 % of the patients is satisfied by the care of the pain, whereas the criteria of evaluation of the RA improve under treatment. The chronic pain, is a complex and multifactorial subjective phenomenon requiring a multidimensional evaluation, while the current criteria of follow-up of the RA (DAS28, ACR criteria) investigate the pain in a single dimension that is the pain intensity.

So, the investigators do not arrange explanation for this observed dichotomy between the improvement of the clinical and biological inflammatory criteria of the RA and on the other hand the persistence of pain.

On the other hand, the interleukin (IL)-6, IL-17 and IL-33 are cytokines occurring in the physiopathology of RA and probably in the pain processing according to recent data of the literature.

The aim of this study is:

• to assess the multidimensional origin of the pain in RA patients by means of questionnaires
• to look for a possible correlation between the serum level of cytokines and pain.