• Katrina E Donahue, Elizabeth R Schulman, Gerald Gartlehner, Beth L Jonas, Emmanuel Coker-Schwimmer, Sheila V Patel, Rachel Palmieri Weber, Carla M Bann, and Meera Viswanathan.
• University of North Carolina Department of Family Medicine, Chapel Hill, NC, USA. kdonahue@med.unc.edu.
• J Gen Intern Med. 2019 Oct 1; 34 (10): 2232-2245.

BackgroundComparative effectiveness of early rheumatoid arthritis (RA) treatments remains uncertain.PurposeCompare benefits and harms of biologic drug therapies for adults with early RA within 1 year of diagnosis.Data SourcesEnglish language articles from the 2012 review to October 2017 identified through MEDLINE, Cochrane Library and International Pharmaceutical Abstracts, gray literature, expert recommendations, reference lists of published literature, and supplemental evidence data requests.Study SelectionTwo persons independently selected studies based on predefined inclusion criteria.Data ExtractionOne reviewer extracted data; a second reviewer checked accuracy. Two independent reviewers assigned risk of bias ratings.Data SynthesisWe identified 22 eligible studies with 9934 participants. Combination therapy with tumor necrosis factor (TNF) or non-TNF biologics plus methotrexate (MTX) improved disease control, remission, and functional capacity compared with monotherapy of either MTX or a biologic. Network meta-analyses found higher ACR50 response (50% improvement) for combination therapy of biologic plus MTX than for MTX monotherapy (relative risk range 1.20 [95% confidence interval (CI), 1.04 to 1.38] to 1.57 [95% CI, 1.30 to 1.88]). No significant differences emerged between treatment discontinuation rates because of adverse events or serious adverse events. Subgroup data (disease activity, prior therapy, demographics, serious conditions) were limited.LimitationsTrials enrolled almost exclusively selected populations with high disease activity. Network meta-analyses were derived from indirect comparisons relative to MTX due to the dearth of head-to-head studies comparing interventions. No eligible data on biosimilars were found.ConclusionsQualitative and network meta-analyses suggest that the combination of MTX with TNF or non-TNF biologics reduces disease activity and improves remission when compared with MTX monotherapy. Overall adverse event and discontinuation rates were similar between treatment groups.RegistrationPROSPERO (available at http://www.crd.york.ac.uk/PROSPERO/display_record.php?ID=CRD42017079260 ).

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