Pill Instead of a Needle May Soon Be Option for RA
A new pill may soon offer people with rheumatoid
arthritis an alternative to the injections and intravenous infusions that many
rely on to treat their disease.
The drug, tofacitinib, is a twice-daily pill that works
by turning down the body's immune attack on its own joints and organs. It works
in a slightly different way than currently available treatments for rheumatoid
arthritis, or RA.
"It's pretty important and pretty exciting, and some
have described it as a biologic drug in a pill," says Jeffrey R. Curtis,
MD, MPH, director of the Arthritis Clinical Intervention Program at the
University of Alabama at Birmingham. Curtis worked on early trials of the
treatment, but was not involved in the current research.
Biologics have revolutionized the treatment of RA, but
they must be taken by injection or IV infusion. They are made from natural
sources that use a biologic method, instead of a chemical method, to make them.
A pair of studies published in the New England Journal of
Medicine show that the treatment works at least as well as Humira, an older
biologic. Tofacitinib also reduced the number of swollen and painful joints in
about twice as many patients compared to a placebo pill. That was true whether
or not it was used in combination with methotrexate, the standard initial
treatment for the disease.
The studies included a total of more than 1,300 people
with RA. Significant improvements in physical function were seen as early as
the second week on the drug.
The studies didn't follow patients long enough to show
whether tofacitinib might slow the physical destruction of the joints as other
disease-modifying anti-rheumatic (DMARD) drugs do.
Both studies were paid for by Pfizer, the company that
hopes to market the drug.
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