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Article History

Received: 29 January 2019

Accepted: 25 July 2019

First Online: 1 August 2019

Ethics approval and consent to participate

: The Ethics Committee (E 191/11) of the Department of Medicine of the University of Frankfurt am Main (“Ethik-Kommission des Fachbereichs Medizin der Goethe-Universität Frankfurt am Main”) rated the study with approval on June 26, 2012.Reference number: 404/11Before the study started, we obtained signed written informed consent from all participants.

: Not applicable.

: JJP was co-investigator and KM project manager in the PANORA study (‘Prevalence of anti-cyclic citrullinated peptide (CCP) positivity in patients with new non-specific onset of musculoskeletal symptoms, possibly related to early rheumatoid arthritis in general practices in Germany’). The PANORA study was conducted by the Fraunhofer Institute and financed by Bristol-Meyer Squibb. JJP and KM are employed by the Institute of General Practice of Goethe University Frankfurt and have never personally received any financial compensation from a pharmaceutical company. AS carried out a systematic review of the self-management of oral anticoagulation in 2014 with funding from the Federation of Austrian Social Insurance Institutions (HVB). She also received financial support from ROCHE Diagnostics to conduct a study on self-management of oral anticoagulation from 2002 to 2005. SH has received honoraria for scientific lectures from Boehringer Ingelheim GmbH, Pfizer GmbH, Daiichi Sankyo GmbH, and Bayer AG. The other authors declare no competing interests.