This article is more than 5 years old. Information may no longer be current.
Most patients who discontinued adalimumab due to low disease activity were still in low disease activity after 3 years
Among patients who discontinued adalimumab plus methotrexate due to low disease activity, about 80% still had low disease activity 3 years later, according to recently published data from Japan. In addition, this group of patients had a lower adverse event rate than patients who continued adalimumab.
Yoshiya Tanaka , MD, PhD, in The First Department of Internal Medicine at the University of Occupational and Environmental Health School of Medicine in Japan, and colleagues conducted three studies: HOPEFUL-1 study; HOPEFUL-2; and HOPEFUL-3. In HOPEFUL-1, patients’ initial therapy was either adalimumab plus methotrexate or methotrexate alone for 26 weeks. This was followed by adalimumab plus methotrexate for 26 weeks. In HOPEFUL-2, patients received either adalimumab plus methotrexate as a continuation from HOPEFUL-1 (continuation group) or methotrexate alone as a discontinuation from the adalimumab group from HOPEFUL-1 (discontinuation group) for 52 weeks. In HOPEFUL-3 (n = 172), patients who completed HOPEFUL-2 were followed for an additional 104 weeks. Of the patients in HOPEFUL-3, 135 with a measured DAS28-C-reative protein at both week 52 and week 208 were included in the analysis of efficacy.
At 208 weeks, 95.1% of patients who continued and 79.7% of patients who discontinued adalimumab had low disease activity. According to change in modified total Sharp score from week 0 to week 208 (64% vs. 30%), initial therapy with adalimumab plus methotrexate was associated with a better outcome than methotrexate alone. In addition, the adverse event rate was significantly lower in the adalimumab discontinuation group (9.7%) vs. the adalimumab continuation group (32.9%). – by Will Offit
Disclosures: Tanaka reports he received consulting fees, speaking fees and/or honoraria from AbbVie, Chugai, Daiichi-Sankyo, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Mitsubishi Tanabe, Astellas, Takeda, Pfizer, Teijin, Asahi Kasei, YL Biologics, Sanofi, Janssen, Eli Lilly and GalxoSmithKline and he received research grants from Mitsubishi Tanabe, Takeda, Daiichi-Sankyo, Chugai, Bristol-Myers Squibb, MSD, Astellas, AbbVie and Eisai.