The intention of this project was to establish a second parallel psoriatic arthritis clinic at Monash Health, in which annual reviews of patients could be undertaken to collect longitudinal data that should provide important data regarding the natural history, treatment responses and impact of disease on an Australian cohort of PsA patients, as well as to prospectively investigate the prevalence and incidence of common metabolic co-morbidities such as hypertension, dyslipidaemia, obesity and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease.
Following the receipt of the grant, a business case was put forward for the clinics and the clinic was approved for commencement at the end of the first quarter of 2020. Working relationships were fostered with the gastroenterology department to facilitate regular fibroscans, a non-invasive test for fatty liver disease. An ethics submission for data collection was submitted and provisionally approved by research governance at Monash Health. Unfortunately, the COVID-19 pandemic halted the commencement of any new clinics just prior to our project getting underway.
I expect to be able to provide a final report with outputs that are relevant to the fellowship in 12 months.