Clinical trial evidence of quality-of-life effects of disease-modifying therapies for multiple sclerosis: a systematic analysis

Increasingly, patients, clinicians, and regulators call for more evidence on the impact of innovative medicines on quality of life (QoL). We assessed the effects of disease-modifying therapies (DMTs) on QoL in people with multiple sclerosis (PwMS). Randomized trials assessing approved DMTs in PwMS with results for at least one outcome referred to as “quality of life” were searched in PubMed and ClinicalTrials.gov. We identified 38 trials published between 1999 and 2023 with a median of 531 participants (interquartile range (IQR) 202 to 941; total 23,225). The evaluated DMTs were mostly interferon-beta (n = 10; 26