Myasthenia Gravis Impairment Index: Sensitivity for Change in Generalized Muscle Weakness

INTRODUCTION: The recently developed Myasthenia Gravis Impairment Index (MGII) is a promising measure as it has less floor effects and a higher relative efficiency in its responsiveness to treatment effect compared to other MG measures. This study aimed at validating the MGII in a Dutch cohort of MG patients and analyzing the sensitivity of MGII compared to MG-ADL for changes in generalized weakness. METHODS: We analyzed (generalized items of; -gen) MGII, quantitative myasthenia gravis (QMG), Myasthenia Gravis Activities of Daily Living (MG-ADL), EQ-5D visual analog, Myasthenia Gravis Composite (MGC) and ACTIVLIM (an ADL questionnaire focusing on generalized weakness) scores in a prospective cohort of 99 MG patients. We investigated correlations between MGII and other outcome measures. We used a generalized linear model to assess whether MGIIgen had an additional sensitivity on top of MG-ADLgen for changes (Δ) in QMGgen in individual patients. RESULTS: MGII had a lower floor effect (4%) compared to QMG (6%), MG-ADL (11%) and MGC (16%). MGII correlated well with QMG (r = 0.68), MG-ADL (r = 0.83) and MGC (r = 0.74). As expected, the correlations with EQ visual analog and ACTIVLIM were lower (r = – 0.57 and – 0.48). ΔMGIIgen had an additional value on top of ΔMG-ADLgen in the prediction of ΔQMGgen (B = 0.54, p = 0.01). DISCUSSION: The MGII score was cross-culturally validated in a Dutch cohort of MG patients. MGII had a higher sensitivity for generalized weakness than MG-ADL.