The subcutaneous formulation of infliximab in dermatology improves therapeutic performance and allows for an improvement in the quality of life of patients, who can administer the therapy at home.
Significant innovations for chronic inflammatory dermatological diseases such as psoriasis e psoriatic arthritisfor which i are now available biobetter drugs, a technological evolution of biosimilar drugs. The latter are characterized by being “similar” in quality, efficacy and safety to the reference biological drugs. Biosimilar drugs have already been a reality for some years, but in recent months the new therapeutic frontier reached is represented by the new formulation of subcutaneous administration of the monoclonal antibody infliximab. This option has offered clinical, logistical and economic improvements.
BIOBETTER DRUGS IN DERMATOLOGY – “Biobetter drugs represent a new concept and an important evolution for the treatment of autoimmune diseases in dermatology such as psoriasis and psoriatic arthritis – he underlines Francesco Cusanopresident OKAY (Association of Italian hospital dermatologists) and director of the Uoc Dermatology at the AO San Pio of Benevento -. We have been using infliximab for some time, but until now it has always been administered intravenously. The new opportunity to also administer it subcutaneously will allow for enormous improvements. Biological drugs for psoriasis and arthritis often use other anti-TNF alphas, which have a broad spectrum of action and are administered subcutaneously, but are less effective than infliximab. The latter, therefore, now that it can in turn be administered subcutaneously, should be considered the drug of first choice. Infliximab is also very competitive against more modern drugs, such as anti-interleukins. Furthermore, infliximab is also highly effective against inflammatory bowel diseases (ulcerative colitis and Crohn’s disease), which often affect patients with psoriasis or arthritis: for this reason it is even more a candidate for first choice drug”.
LOGISTIC AND ECONOMIC ADVANTAGES – In addition to the clinical advantages, there are opportunities from an economic point of view. “If biosimilars for the NHS already involve a lower cost than the originators, biobetters also have a positive effect on the indirect costs of the patient and on his quality of life – adds Cusano -. The subcutaneous formulation, in fact, allows you not to go to the hospital for therapy, but to be able to simply perform it at home. For clinicians, this means the possibility of freeing up resources within their hospitals, while patients avoid wasting time, with fewer days of work lost, less commitment to treatment, lower social cost of the disease”.
PSORIASIS AND ARTHRITIS IN ITALY – In Italy there are over 2 million patients with psoriasis, about 3% of the population, while there are 300 thousand patients with psoriatic arthritis, although there are different degrees of severity and there is an alternation of remission and exacerbation phases. Approximately one third of patients with psoriasis are affected by a severe form and amenable to systemic therapy. Infliximab, manufactured by South Korea’s Celltrion Healthcare, is indicated for the treatment of moderate to severe plaque psoriasis in adult patients who have failed to respond to or are contraindicated or intolerant to other systemic treatments including cyclosporine, methotrexate or PUVA (psoralen + ultraviolet A). For the treatment of psoriatic arthritis, active and progressive infliximab is indicated in adult patients when the response to previous DMARD treatments has been inadequate.
Nurse Times editorial team
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