CRUSE®—An innovative mobile application for patient monitoring and management in chronic spontaneous urticaria

Sophia Neisinger*, Bernardo Sousa Pinto, Aiste Ramanauskaite, Jean Bousquet, Karsten Weller, Martin Metz, Markus Magerl, Emek Kocatürk, Ivan Cherrez-Ojeda, Ana M. Gimenez-Arnau, Claudio Alberto S. Parisi, Sabine Altrichter, Luis Felipe Ensina, Laurence Bouillet, Riccardo Asero, Margarida Gonçalo, Carole Guillet, Krzysztof Rutkowski, Jonathan A. Bernstein, Hannah HardinKiran Godse, Zenon Brzoza, Jose Ignacio Larco Sousa, Simon Francis Thomsen, Martijn van Doorn, Michihiro Hide, Young Min Ye, Staffan Vanderse, Lāsma Lapiņa, Jonny Peter, Zuotao Zhao, Lianyi Han, Iman Nasr, Heike Rockmann-Helmbach, Jennifer Astrup Sørensen, Rabia Öztaş Kara, Natalja Kurjāne, Andrii I. Kurchenko, Igor Kaidashev, Vladyslav Tsaryk, Roman Stepanenko, Marcus Maurer

*Corresponding author for this work

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Abstract

Background: Chronic spontaneous urticaria (CSU) is unpredictable and can severely impair patients' quality of life. Patients with CSU need a convenient, user-friendly platform to complete patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs) on their mobile devices. CRUSE®, the Chronic Urticaria Self Evaluation app, aims to address this unmet need. Methods: CRUSE® was developed by an international steering committee of urticaria specialists. Priorities for the app based on recent findings in CSU were defined to allow patients to track and record their symptoms and medication use over time and send photographs. The CRUSE® app collects patient data such as age, sex, disease onset, triggers, medication, and CSU characteristics that can be sent securely to physicians, providing real-time insights. Additionally, CRUSE® contains PROMs to assess disease activity and control, which are individualised to patient profiles and clinical manifestations. Results: CRUSE® was launched in Germany in March 2022 and is now available for free in 17 countries. It is adapted to the local language and displays a country-specific list of available urticaria medications. English and Ukrainian versions are available worldwide. From July 2022 to June 2023, 25,710 observations were documented by 2540 users; 72.7% were females, with a mean age of 39.6 years. At baseline, 93.7% and 51.3% of users had wheals and angioedema, respectively. Second-generation antihistamines were used in 74.0% of days. Conclusions: The initial data from CRUSE® show the wide use and utility of effectively tracking patients' disease activity and control, paving the way for personalised CSU management.

Original languageEnglish
Article numbere12328
JournalClinical and Translational Allergy
Volume14
Issue number1
Number of pages12
ISSN2045-7022
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2024

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2024 The Authors. Clinical and Translational Allergy published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of European Academy of Allergy and Clinical Immunology.

Keywords

  • chronic urticaria self evaluation (CRUSE) app
  • digital tools
  • mHealth apps
  • patient-reported outcome measures
  • wheals and angioedema

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