Rheumatoid arthritis patients have been treated with disease modifying anti-rheumatic drugs (DMARDs) and the newer biologic drugs. We sought to compare and rank the biologics with respect to efficacy. We performed a literature search identifying 54 publications encompassing 9 biologics. We conducted a multiple treatment comparison regression analysis letting the number experiencing a 50% improv...

Methods A systematic search between January 2000 and May 2013 was conducted using EMBASE, Ovid MEDLINE, Evidence Based Medicine Reviews-ACP Journal Club, Cochrane libraries, and EBM Reviews. Studies investigating the efficacy of anti-TNFa therapy, as the second biologic treatment for ACU, in children (≤16 yrs) refractory to a first course of a single anti-TNFa treatment, topical and/or systemic...

Tofacitinib is an active immunosuppressant: oral administration (unnecessary cold chain) acts as a potent and selective inhibitor of Janus kinase family (JAK), more specifically JAK3 and JAK1, with an important role in cytokine signal transduction that regulates survival, proliferation, differentiation and apoptosis of lymphocytes4. adequate response in monotherapy. may provide multiple benefit...

We thank Professor Zeidler for the interest in our study, in which we showed an increased chance and a shorter time to achieve disease-modifying antirheumatic drug (DMARD)-free sustained remission in patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) treated with present strategies (early start of methotrexate and treat-to-target approach) compared with treatment strategies that were applied 10 years ago....

The 12 previous volumes in this series are: 1999 – Combination DMARD therapy in rheumatoid arthritis 2000 – Bone mass in the rheumatic diseases 2001 – Controversies in COX-2 inhibitor therapy 2002 – Innovative therapies for spondyloarthritides 2003 – Early arthritis 2004 – Benefit/risk of new drugs for rheumatoid arthritis 2005 – Quantitative clinical assessment of rheumatic diseases 2006 – Rem...

OBJECTIVE To provide a rational model for the use of disease-modifying antirheumatic drug (DMARD) combinations in the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis. METHODS The DMARDs used today were examined for their mechanisms of action, kinetics, and toxicity, and collected into tabular formats for easier comparison. From these tables, matrices of potential positive or negative interfaces among combi...

INTRODUCTION This article reports the latest recommendations of the French Society for Rheumatology (SFR) regarding the management of rheumatoid arthritis (RA). METHODS New recommendations were developed by hospital- and community-based rheumatologists having extensive experience with RA and a patient self-help organization representative. They rest on the recently issued EULAR recommendation...

BACKGROUND To evaluate the long-term safety and efficacy of etanercept treatment in Polish patients with juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA). MATERIAL/METHODS The study involved patients, fulfilling the JIA criteria of the International League of Associations of Rheumatology (ILAR), who were started on etanercept therapy after methotrexate and other synthetic disease-modifying antirheumatic d...

BACKGROUND Limited information exists on the impact of tumor necrosis factor inhibition on COPD exacerbations. This retrospective study characterized this impact among COPD patients with underlying autoimmune conditions, exposed to tumor necrosis factor inhibitors (TNFi) and/or non-biologic disease-modifying antirheumatic drugs (DMARDs). PATIENTS AND METHODS Adult COPD patients with ≥1 diagno...

OBJECTIVES To describe the use of disease-modifying anti-rheumatic drugs (DMARDs) in the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and changing trends in their use. METHODS We used the General Practice Research Database (GPRD) to describe DMARD use by patients with RA identified using ICD-9 codes. The GPRD is a UK national database containing records of more than 7 million individuals from 683 g...