• Alberto Lo Gullo, Simone Parisi, Andrea Becciolini, Marino Paroli, Elena Bravi, Romina Andracco, Valeria Nucera, Francesca Ometto, Federica Lumetti, Antonella Farina, Patrizia Del Medico, Matteo Colina, Viviana Ravagnani, Palma Scolieri, Maddalena Larosa, Marta Priora, Elisa Visalli, Olga Addimanda, Rosetta Vitetta, Alessandro Volpe, Alessandra Bezzi, Francesco Girelli, Aldo Biagio Molica Colella, Rosalba Caccavale, Eleonora DI Donato, Giuditta Adorni, Daniele Santilli, Gianluca Lucchini, Eugenio Arrigoni, Ilaria Platè, Natalia Mansueto, Aurora Ianniello, Enrico Fusaro, Maria Chiara Ditto, Vincenzo Bruzzese, Dario Camellino, Gerolamo Bianchi, Francesca Serale, Rosario Foti, Giorgio Amato, Francesco DE Lucia, Ylenia Dal Bosco, Roberta Foti, Massimo Reta, Alessia Fiorenza, Guido Rovera, Antonio Marchetta, Maria C Focherini, Fabio Mascella, Simone Bernardi, Gilda Sandri, Dilia Giuggioli, Carlo Salvarani, Maria Ilenia DE Andres, Veronica Franchina, Francesco Molica Colella, Giulio Ferrero, and Alarico Ariani.
• Rheumatology Unit, ARNAS Garibaldi, Catania, Italy - albertologullo@virgilio.it.
• Minerva Med. 2024 Aug 1; 115 (4): 430438430-438.

BackgroundUpadacitinib (UPA) is a selective, reversible Janus kinase inhibitor (JAKi) approved for the treatment of RA. However, there is still no solid evidence on the long-term efficacy of UPA in treated patients. The purpose of this study was to determine the efficacy of UPA to obtain remission or low disease activity (LDA) in a series of UPA patients in patients with RA after 6 and 12 months of treatment in a real-world setting.MethodsA series of 111 consecutive patients treated with UPA in 23 rheumatology centers were enrolled. Personal history, treatment history and disease activity at baseline, after 6 and 12 months were recorded. Intention-to-treat (ITT) and per-protocol (PP) analyses assessed achievement of remission or LDA or defined as DAS28 <2.6 and ≤3.2, respectively. Logistic regression analysis examined the role of several independent factors on the reduction of disease activity after 6 months of treatment.ResultsOf the initial group of 111 subjects at baseline, 86 and 29 participants completed clinical assessments at 6 and 12 months. According to ITT analysis, the rates of remission and LDA were 18% and 18% at 6 months and 31.5% and 12.5% at 12 months, respectively. PP analysis showed higher rates of remission and LDA at 6 (23.3% and 19.8%) and 12 months (55.2% and 20.7%). Results of multivariate logistic regression analysis indicated that a low DAS28 score (P=0.045) was the only predictor of achieving remission at 6 months. None of the baseline factors predicted remission/LDA at 6 months.ConclusionsRA patients treated with UPA achieved a significant rate of disease remission or LDA in a real-world setting. The 6-month response was found to depend only on the baseline value of DAS28, while it was not influenced by other factors such as disease duration, line of treatment or concomitant therapy with conventional synthetic disease-modifying antirheumatic drugs (csDMARDs) or corticosteroids.

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