All News
Oral Surveillance Changes in Advanced Therapy Use in RA
The safety of tofacitinib and TNF inhibitors was studied in high risk rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients in the ORAL Surveillance study, which culminated in an FDA warning in January 2021 on the cardiovascular, cancer and VTE risks associated with JAK inhibitor use.
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Hard Decisions in RA (9.1.2023)
Dr. Jack Cush reviews the news and journal reports from this past week on RheumNow, and introduces our September campaign - "Hard Decisions in RA".
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ACR Position Paper: Cost Impact of Rheumatologic Care
The American College of Rheumatology (ACR) has published evidence that rheumatologic care can save more than $2700 per patient per year.
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FDA Approves Canakinumab for Gout Flares
The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved canakinumab (Ilaris) for the treatment of gout flares in adults who cannot be treated with NSAIDs, colchicine, or repeated courses of corticosteroids. The drug is also indicated for people who could not tolerate or had an inadequate response to NSAIDs or colchicine.
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SGLT2 Inhibitors as Gout Treatment
Patients with gout and type 2 diabetes treated with SGLT2 inhibitors not only had reduced numbers of gout flares, but also lived longer compared with other such patients receiving other medications, researchers said.
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2023 ACR/EULAR Antiphospholipid Syndrome Classification Criteria
The American College of Rheumatology (ACR) and EULAR have combined efforts to establish an international multidisciplinary Steering Committee to develop classification criteria for the new antiphospholipid syndrome (APS) to be applied in observational studies and clinical trials.
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Hip Replacement Surgery After Age 90
Potentially modifiable comorbid conditions and complications have a major impact on the risks of total hip arthroplasty (THA) for people in their nineties, reports a study in The Journal of Bone & Joint Surgery.
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Before You Know It (8.25.2023)
Dr. Jack Cush comments on the news and journal articles from the past week on RheumNow.com: VEXAS scoring, scleroderma sine scleroderma and head scratchers from southeast Asia.
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Biologic Adherence and Drug Survival in RA Patients
A real-world rheumatoid arthritis (RA) cohort study from Israel shows significant variability of drug survival using biologic disease-modifying anti-rheumatics drugs (bDMARDs) and targeted synthetic DMARDs (tsDMARDs).
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Fracture Risk Quantified for Older Spondyloarthritis Patients
Medicare beneficiaries with ankylosing spondylitis (AS) incur frequent bone fractures, a new study indicated, with the risk boosted by some unsurprising factors but also including one that was not expected.
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Mono- and Oligo- are Different (8.18.2023)
Dr. Jack Cush reviews the news and journal reports from RheumNow.com this past week.
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COSMOS: Guselkumab's Immunologic Benefits in Psoriatic Arthritis
The IL-23 inhibitor guselkumab was studied in active psoriatic arthritis patients in the phase 3b COSMOS trial, and shown to be clinically effective while reducing multiple effector cytokines, including those associated with the IL-23/IL-17 pathway.
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Residual Disease in Controlled Axial Spondyloarthritis
Despite being in a state of remission or low disease activity state, in patients with axial spondyloarthritis, up to 42% may still have residual disease.
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Stable Safety Outcomes with Abatacept
The safety of abatacept was studied using patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) from 7 European registers, revealing safety signals on par with that previously reported with no new safety concerns.
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The Adalimumab Biosimilar Glut
In 2023, three marketed biosimilars (Actemra, Stelara, Humira) had their patents expire, opening opportunities for multiple new biosimilars; but with competition comes a word salad of new drug names, confusion and nonsensical discounts.
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Glucocorticoid Affects Weight, but not Blood Pressure in RA
A pooled analysis of 5 randomized controlled trials (RCTs) shows that the effects of 2 years of low-dose glucocorticoid (GC) treatment in rheumatoid arthritis (RA) can significantly increase increase body weight, but not blood pressure.
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Pizza and Rheumatoid Arthritis (8.11.2023)
Dr. Jack Cush reviews the news and journal reports from the wonderful wide world of Rheumatology. This week:
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Colchicine or Prednisone in CPPD?
The COLCHICORT trial in patients with acute calcium pyrophosphate crystal arthritis (CPPD) demonstrated equivalent efficacy for both colchicine and prednisone, yet different safety signals were seen.
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Steroid Tapering Called Safe in Older RA Patients
Most rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients 65 and older who had 5 mg/day of prednisolone added to standard care were successfully weaned from the steroid without seeing substantial increases in disease activity, researchers said.
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Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome Review
The Cleveland Clinic Journal has published a full-read review of postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome (POTS), a condition often seen in clinic with symptoms like fibromyalgia, but is clinically diagnosed with finding sustained tachycardia upon standing without orthostatic hypotension.
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