PMS36 - Patterns of Biological Therapy Use in Patients with Rheumatoid Artrhitis in a Real-Life Setting in Colombia

Abstract

Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is a chronic, inflammatory and systemic disease of with a prevalence between 0.5 and 1.3%; biological therapy for RA has proven efficacy and represent promising advances for individuals with the disease, and have been associated with significant improvement in outcomes including reduction in pain, joint swelling, serologic inflammatory indices, and rates of radiologic damage. The objective of this study was to describe the patterns of usage of biological therapy and resulting disease activity during a 12 month period in a RA specialized center in Colombia. We used data from the clinical charts in a specialized RA center, containing demographic characteristics, medical prescription and disease activity during 2016. Descriptive epidemiology was performed. Two-group comparisons were performed using Student-t test (p values with a significance level of 0.05. During a 12 month period 895 patients were under biological treatment. 83% were woman and 17% were men, mean age was 59 ± 12 years. The majority of patients (95%) were between 40 and 92 years old. Regarding usage of biological therapy 25% of patients received Certolizumab, 18% Etanercept, 12% Rituximab, 11% Adalimumab, 9% tocilizumab, 11% Abatacept, 7% infliximab, 4% Golimumab , 3% Tofacitninib. Mean DAS28 at 3 months was 2.99 ±1.13, at 6 months 2.99 ±1.05 and at 12 month 2.98 ±1.02. The comparison between disease activity and biological therapy were statistical significant. Biological therapy is effective for the management of RA in a real life setting. Also, as other studies had shown the most used biologics are Certolizumab and Etanercept.