Day 3 was a sunny warm day in Milan at the 2023 EULAR Congress meeting. Here are a few of my favorite abstracts from today.

Day 2 at the international EULAR Congress meeting is always bigger and busier. There were sessions on JIA therapies, crystal arthritis, novel drugs for SLE and Sjogren's, early RA and preclinical RA interventions, IgG4 disease, osteoporosis and the growth and application of artificial intelligence in medicine and rheumatology.

EULAR 2023 opens tomorrow, Wednesday May 31st, with hundreds of novel presentations and pivotal clinical trials, many being featured industry sponsored clinical trials and research on their novel agents. Below is a collection of the featured abstracts, and presentation times from EULAR

Belimumab is a B-lymphocyte stimulator (BLyS)-specific inhibitor that is FDA approved for the treatment of active lupus and lupus nephritis, based on a few pivotal trials; and now a metanalysis supports its use in active lupus nephritis.

Dr. Jack Cush reviews more than a dozen news, journal articles and RNL highlights from this past week on RheumNow.com.

Recent reports have suggested a rising and unrecognized number of patients with psoriatic arthritis (PsA) and axial spondyloarthritis (axSpA) compared to rheumatoid arthritis (RA).

A study of adults aged 45-85 yrs shows that knee osteoarthritis (OA) is an independent risk factor for falls, suggesting a greater need for awareness and prevention.

Multinational metanalyses of data between 1989 and 2022 shows that NSAID prescriptions have decreased over time, and differs according to geographical locations.

Giant cell arteritis (GCA) has a different phenotype when diagnosed late in life compared with earlier onset, a large Italian cohort study indicated.

Dr. Jack Cush reviews the news and journal reports from this past week on RheumNow.com.  This week we delve into some odd associations, repeat drug warnings and the consequences of antirheumatic therapies.

Peresolimab is a humanized IgG1 monoclonal antibody that acts as a programmed cell death protein 1 (PD-1) agonist (stimulator). The NEJM reports that PER met its efficacy primary endpont in treating patients with active rheumatoid arthritis (RA). 

A new MSK syndrome of inflammatory enthesitis/arthritis/tenosynovitis has been described in atopic dermatitis (AD) patients treated with the IL-4 receptor antagonist, dupilumab.

Brepocitinib is a novel tyrosine kinase 2/Janus kinase 1 inhibitor and has been studied in patients with moderately-to-severely active psoriatic arthritis (PsA), showing impressive efficacy at both 16 weeks and 52 weeks.

Eosinophilic granulomatosis with polyangiitis (EGPA) is a rare form of anti-neutrophil cytoplasmic antibody (ANCA)-associated vasculitis, affecting between 10 and 14 cases per million globally. This adult disorder has a mean age at diagnosis of nearly 50 years and affects both sexes equally, presenting with pulmonary symptoms (asthma), eosinophilia and granulomatous or vasculitic involvement of several organs. A multidisciplinary, multinational European group has developed evidence-based, guidelines for the diagnosis and management of EGPA, intended to include recent advances.

Fibromyalgia patients hoping to see a more effective and convenient formulation of cyclobenzaprine at their local pharmacies must wait for an ongoing phase III trial -- the product's third -- to finish, as the first two delivered mixed results.

A retrospecitve cohort comparision of juvenile (jSSc) and adult-onset (aSSc) systemic sclerosis (SSc) are both rare but present differently.  

Analysis of patient data from five Nordic registries shows that the uptake of newer biologic or targeted synthetic disease-modifying antirheumatic drugs (b/tsDMARDs) in psoriatic arthritis (PsA) was mainly in biologic-experienced patients.