Table 4.

Summary of descriptions of flares for patients with SLE and rheumatologists.

	Patients with SLE	Rheumatologists
Patient-Reported Symptoms	The majority of patients described flare symptoms as joint pain, fatigue, and skin issues. Other commonly symptoms included swelling, myalgias, mood disturbance, and a prodrome of flu-like symptoms. Several patients noted brain fog, diffuse pain, and weakness.	Around half of rheumatologists included fatigue, pain or other patient reported symptoms as part of a lupus flare. Two specifically excluded patient-reported symptoms.
Objective Findings	The majority of patients did not consider objective findings to be part of a flare. Only one patient included nephritis and one patient noted lab abnormalities as signs of flare.	All rheumatologists defined flare as SLE disease activity involving organs with more than half requiring objective findings. A few noted an escalation in therapy as part of the flare definition. Two included persistent activity as a subtype of flare.