Anti-TNF treatment shows potential benefits to psoriatic arthritis patients, says study

A new study has highlighted the potential benefits anti-TNF treatment can offer people with psoriatic arthritis.

The study is seen as significant because it has used data from patients in a real-world setting, rather than controlled test conditions, which provides doctors with a clearer view of how drugs work in routine clinical practice.

As well as showing that people with psoriatic arthritis can safely remain on anti-TNF treatment for a prolonged period, it also indicates that it can help reduce reliance on other therapies.

For the study, led by the University of Siena, Italy, and published in the Journal of Rheumatology, a total of 420 people with psoriatic arthritis who had not yet taken biologic treatment but were about to begin treatment with the anti-TNF therapies adalimumab, etanercept or infliximab, were enrolled in the trail, and their progress on these drugs was followed over four years.

The researchers noted drug survival rates – the number of people remaining on the treatments after a given period – as well as how many of the patients continued to rely on glucocorticoid therapy at the same time.

They found that after four years, around 51% of patients remained users of the first anti-TNF therapy they were prescribed and that this rate was significantly higher for etanercept, at 58.9% than it was for adalimumab at 43.9% and infliximab at 44%.

The study also showed that patients taking etanercept also had the lowest rate of drug discontinuation, with women being the strong predictor for needing to stop treatment.

It also showed that patients’ average daily dose of prednisone significantly decreased over time, with the proportion of patients taking glucocorticoids falling to 36.5% at two years, 29.9% at three years and 22.6% at four years.

The researchers say, “In real-world settings, TNF inhibitors showed a high rate of drug survival at four years. Further, the need for glucocorticoids for controlling active psoriatic arthritis was lowered with time.”

Katherine Free, research liaison and communications manager, says “Anti-TNF therapies, developed in part through funding from Arthritis Research UK, have revolutionised the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis in the last few decades, and this study adds to the increasing body of evidence that they are also effective in treating psoriatic arthritis, a type of arthritis affecting the skin and joints.

“Our research has recently shown that these patients respond well to early, intensive treatment with these drugs, and that this treatment regime can be effective at getting symptoms under control and reducing the inflammation in the joints.”

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