I was truly stunned Monday when it was announced that Glenn Frey, from the Eagles, had died as a result of complications from his rheumatoid arthritis, ulcerative colitis and pneumonia. It was unexpected, shocking and so wrong that someone so young would die, and from RA. It hit me hard - a bit worse than Lennon, but not as bad as 9/11.

Researchers from Belgium studied patient adherence to MTX (given orally or via injection) in 129 rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients over a 16-week period using an electronic monitoring system and two validated adherence questionnaires. Full adherence was noted in 58% of RA patients, and 75 % skipped at most one dose during 16 weeks.

Six volunteers were admitted to the University Hospital of Rennes in France last week after partaking in the Phase I trial of a new medication meant to treat mood disorders such as anxiety.

Comparative Harmful Risks with Targeted Immunomodulators. Desai et al did a systematic review of the literature, findings of 10 head-to-head RCTs and 51 observational studies. They found that risk of treatment discontinuation due to AEs was higher with infliximab than with adalimumab or etanercept in RA, PsA, and AS.

Medical Research Council study shows MRI lesions may predict which patients will have more rapidly progressing osteoarthritis. 

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has issued a travel advisory for individuals traveling to the Caribbean and Latin America where infection with Zika virus has been prevalent. The CDC has specifically cautioned pregnant women not to travel to those areas as the Zika virus has been linked to a serious birth defects.

Cosentyx (secukinumab) was approved by the FDA on 15 January, 2016 for patients with active ankyosing spondylitis (AS) and psoriatic arthritis (PsA). Secukinumab was approved in the European Union last year for both AS and PsA.  Until now, this agent was FDA-approved for moderate to severe plaque psoriasis only.  

Treatment paradigms for managing pregnancy in rheumatoid arthritis (RA) have been challenged in recent years with the introduction of new agents and reclassification of drug safety during pregnancy by the FDA.

Almost half of patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) in the UK receive glucocorticoids from primary care physicians, and of those who are prescribed glucocorticoids, more than half receive more than 10 mg a day.

With so much controversy surrounding the American Board of Medical Specialties' Maintenance of Certification program in 2015, especially as it pertained to the ABIM, Dr. Westby Fisher recaps some of the earlier announcements about the ABMS MOC program, then summarizes the year's most pertinent developments to serve as a springboard for 2016. 

Hanly and coworkers have reported the results of a large lupus cohort study involving 1827 patients. SLE patients were enrolled early in their disease (0.5 years) and were followed for a mean of 4.6 years. Lupus nephritis (LN) was found in 38% patients, with 81% presenting with LN at enrolment and 19% during follow-up. LN was more likely in patients who were younger, male and ethnic (African, Asian or Hispanic).

Wayne J Riley, MD, MPH, MBA, MACP, president of the American College of Physicians (ACP) sent a letter to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reacting to its Draft Guideline for the Use of Opioids for Chronic Pain.

Drug prices increased an average of 10% in 2015 (after a 13.5% increase in 2014) and includes big name drugs from major pharmaceutical companies. This comes at a time when generic drugs have skyrocketed to the point of inciting a Senate investigation, and rare drugs for rare disorders being overpriced by companies like Valeant.

As the never-ending battle with refractory gout continues, the need for more safe and effective treatments remains. Often, steady remission and target urate levels are not achieved with allopurinol alone.

A patient recently asked me, “What do you think it’s like to have RA” and “How would you describe it to someone you just met?”   Could I walk a mile in her shoes?  Here's my version and theirs.