Study unveils rheumatoid arthritis treatment hope

The findings published in The Lancet show that patients who have previously been treated with other TNF-a inhibitors or patients who have inadequate responses to one or two other TNF-a inhibitors could respond to this new immunosuppressive drug.

TNF-a inhibitors are commonly used to treat rheumatoid arthritis, but between 30% and 50% of patients prescribed these drugs have an inadequate response or are intolerant to the therapy.

Patients may often be treated with more than one TNF-a inhibitor, although tests have not been done to see if those who do not respond would benefit from switching to another.

As part of the Go-After trial, led by Professor Josef Smolen from the University of Vienna, patients with active rheumatoid arthritis who had previously been treated with one or more TNF-a inhibitor (etanercept, adalimumab or infliximab) were given golimumab.

The results show that significantly more patients on golimumab achieved at least a 20% improvement in arthritis symptoms (ACR 20) than those on placebo.

A further 35% of patients on 50mg of golimumab and 38% of patients on 100mg of golimumab achieved ACR 20 at week 14, compared with 18% of patients receiving placebo.

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