Biosimilar

The net prices of four biologics — filgrastim, pegfilgrastim, infliximab and insulin glargine — all decreased in the face of competition from biosimilars or other substitutes, even without interchangeability, according to findings published in JAMA Network Open.

Despite pressure from the Trump administration and Congress to curb rising drug costs, pharmaceutical companies — in what has become a common industry practice — have begun January 2020 by instituting a bevy of price increases.

By Kashyap Patel, MD

Switching to a biosimilar would be a “feasible treatment choice,” and is associated with maintaining clinical efficacy in patients with noninfectious uveitis who previously received the reference biologic, according to data published in Frontiers in Pharmacology.

Although infliximab doses can frequently increase threefold or more for patients with rheumatoid arthritis, the savings from the current price of its biosimilar still substantially offsets the cost of alternative infused TNF inhibitor biologics with no biosimilar, according to findings published in Arthritis Research & Therapy.

The FDA has approved the fourth biosimilar to infliximab, infliximab-axxq, for all eligible indications of the biologic product.

The top stories in endocrinology last week included the FDA’s approval of a higher dose insulin glargine for children with diabetes, along with new data that suggest the readmission rate after pituitary surgery in the United States has remained unchanged since 2010.

Endocrine Today has compiled a list of recent FDA news stories relating to endocrine practice. Drugs under consideration included those for thyroid eye disease, diabetes, hypertriglyceridemia, Prader-Willi syndrome and nonalcoholic steatohepatitis.

The European Commission has approved the subcutaneous formulation of Celltrion’s infliximab biosimilar for adult patients with active rheumatoid arthritis who have had an inadequate response to a prior DMARD, as well as patients with severe, active and progressive disease not previously treated with DMARDs, according to a manufacturer press release.

Direct-to-consumer advertisements in health care occasionally provide patients with helpful information that sends them into the clinic with appropriate questions for their doctor. These questions, then, occasionally spark frank conversations that occasionally translate into shared decision-making to produce positive outcomes.