A Tool to Assist Rheumatologists to Engage Their Lupus Patients: the Purple Butterfly.

Objective Translating the highly technical medical jargon of SLE into understandable concepts for patients, their families and individuals without expertise in SLE is a serious challenge. To facilitate communication and enable self-management in SLE, we aimed to create an innovative visual tool, the Purple Butterfly.Methods We selected clinically representative criteria for SLE and transposed them as graphical features in an attractive and meaningful visual. We developed a script in R programming language that automatically transposes clinical data into this visualization. We asked SLE patients from a local cohort about the relevance, usefulness and acceptability of this visual tool in an online pilot survey.Results The innovative Purple Butterfly features 11 key clinical criteria: age; sex; organ damage; disease activity; comorbidities; use of antimalarials, prednisone, immunosuppressants and biologics; and patient-reported physical and mental health-related quality of life. Each Purple Butterfly provides the health portrait of one SLE patient at one medical visit, and the automatic compilation of the butterflies can illustrate a patient's clinical journey over time. All survey participants agreed that they would like to use the Purple Butterfly to visualize the course of their SLE over time, and 9 of 10 agreed it should be used during their medical consultations.Conclusion The Purple Butterfly nurtures effective doctor-patient communication by providing concise visual summaries of lupus patients' health conditions. We believe the Purple Butterfly has the potential to empower patients to take charge of their condition, enhance healthcare coordination and raise awareness about SLE. What does this mean for patients?We created the Purple Butterfly, a visual tool specifically developed for people with lupus that promotes self-management. Lupus is a complex arthritic disease with unpredictable symptoms manifesting across the body. Each person's experience with lupus is unique, and collaboration between patients and their healthcare professionals is fundamental for efficient management. The Purple Butterfly improves doctor-patient communication by presenting concise summaries of one's health in an easy-to-understand yet clinically rigorous visual format. Like an interpreter between patients and healthcare providers, this innovative tool can foster knowledge sharing, clarify goal setting for individualized care and enhance the overall quality of care around lupus. Graphical Abstract