No abstract

Efficacy and safety profiles of biologics have been established for moderate to severe psoriasis. However, inefficacy or adverse events sometimes require changing the treatment to other biologics. Here, we examine the effectiveness of this strategy. We retrospectively investigated cases requiring switching biologics. We enrolled 275 psoriatic patients treated with biologics between January 2010 and December 2014 in our hospital. Of these, 51 required a switch to another biologic. First-line therapies were infliximab (IFX, n = 26), adalimumab (ADA, n = 18) and ustekinumab (UST, n = 7), and second-line therapies were IFX (n = 5), ADA (n = 21) and UST (n = 25). Reasons for switching were inefficacy (n = 38), adverse events (n = 11) and others (n = 2). The details were primary failure (n = 15), secondary failure (n = 23) and infusion reactions (n = 8). In 49 patients who switched biologics due to inefficacy and adverse events, the mean Psoriasis Area and Severity Index (PASI) score at week 16 was 4.3 for first-line therapies and 2.9 for second-line therapies (P < 0.05). Switching to a second biologic therapy to address the first's inefficacy or adverse events often results in significant improvement in moderate to severe psoriasis.

No abstract

Obesity is thought to be involved in the pathogenesis of psoriasis, although its impact on the therapeutic response to systemic treatments remains unclear. The aim of this study was to examine the association of body mass index (BMI) with the efficacy of ustekinumab in Japanese patients with psoriasis. Clinical data from a cohort of 111 Japanese patients treated with ustekinumab 45 mg between July 2011 and March 2014 were retrospectively evaluated. The measured outcome was improvement in the psoriasis area and severity index (PASI) score at week 16. Patients with BMI ≥ 25 and BMI < 25 had comparable rates of ≥50 and 75 % improvement in PASI (PASI-50 and PASI-75, respectively), whereas patients with BMI ≥ 25 had significantly lower PASI-90 and PASI-100 response rates. Patients with BMI ≥ 25 also showed significantly lower percent reduction in PASI than those with BMI < 25 at week 16 (85 vs. 74 %, P < 0.004). BMI was negatively correlated with percent reduction in PASI, whereas body weight was not. These results show that a higher BMI, but not body weight, is associated with lower effectiveness of ustekinumab for psoriasis. BMI ≥ 25 could therefore be a negative predictor of achieving PASI-90 and PASI-100 in patients with psoriasis when starting ustekinumab.

No abstract