News

Women with rheumatoid arthritis are concerned with pregnancy and parenting issues and require more information from their doctors, say researchers writing in ACR Open Rheumatology this month.

AbbVie announced on Friday that the Food and Drug Administration approved the oral once-daily JAK inhibitor Rinvoq (upadacitinib) for adults with moderate to severe active rheumatoid arthritis who have had an inadequate response or intolerance to methotrexate.

The JAK inhibitor from AbbVie has shown significant benefit for RA patients over 2 weeks of treatment.

The JAK inhibitor could receive consideration as a rheumatoid arthritis therapy in both Europe and the US in the following year.

Both TNF inhibitors and non-TNFi biologic DMARDs increase the risk of serious infection in rheumatoid arthritis patients compared to conventional synthetic DMARDs. Despite the risk, the treatments are effective in reducing disease activity, researchers report.

One of the most common topics among healthcare providers and patients is the growing conversation around medical marijuana and CBD oils, particularly, it’s potential to alleviate pain and improve quality of life. In this Q&A, Nancy Delnay, a pediatric nurse practitioner with Akron Children’s Hospital, discussed the state of medical marijuana and CBD oils.

The jury is still out on whether vitamin D supplementation can prevent and improve knee osteoarthritis, according to a review published in ACR Open Rheumatology. 

Adults with rapid onset knee osteoarthritis that occurs and progressess within as little as four years, are more likely to receive pharmacological treatments or even surgery than those who live with the condition long-term.

The JAK1 inhibitor filgotinib has been shown to be effective in rheumatoid arthritis patients who failed previous treatment with one or more biologic DMARD.

A study published in JAMA Ophthalmology shows that giant cell arteritis affects black and white patients equally, despite previous reports that suggest the condition is relatively rare in black patients.

Modern pharmacologic therapies for rheumatoid arthritisare effective in controlling inflammation and preventing bone erosions however, a multitude of factors are likely to blame for ongoing bone loss in rheumatoid arthritis.

Temporal artery biopsy is a useful test for diagnosing giant cell arteritis but may miss some cases, research shows.

Temporal artery biopsy is a useful test for diagnosing giant cell arteritis but may miss some cases, research shows.

Bone erosion, fat in joint spaces (backfill), and ankylosis visible on MRI could help identify women with axial spondyloarthritis, investigators wrote in a research article published last month in Arthritis & Rheumatology.

In Europe, an expert panel  is recommending new evidence-based classification criteria for the four classic forms of hereditary recurrent fevers and for non-hereditary, periodic fever, aphthosis, pharyngitis and adenitis.

Pregnant women with systemic lupus erythematosus often discontinue their lupus medications during pregnancy despite recommendations to continue them.

Plasma microbial translocation may play a role in the development of autoantibodies in systemic lupus erythematosus, researchers find. The discovery may lead to new treatments in lupus.

The FDA suggests only limited use of tofacitinib to treat rheumatoid arthritis, ulcerative colitis, or psoriatic arthritis.

The established criteria for radiographic axial spondyloarthritis and axial spondyloarthritis that is classified as ankylosing spondylitis-is essentially the same, report physicians who recommend the interchangeable use of the terms "ankylosing spondylitis" and "radiographic axial spondyloarthritis."

Periodontal disease and periodontal inflammation appear to be present in individuals who are at risk of developing rheumatoid arthritis long before they begin to show signs of disease, shows new research published in JAMA Network Open.

Identifying and treating symptoms that can appear years before the clinical onset of rheumatoid arthritis could play a role in helping patients offset the condition. And now, new research that identifies a bacteria as a potential cause of these symptoms has one rheumatologist positing whether improved oral care, or maybe a vaccine, might be effective in preventing rheumatoid arthritis.

A 19-year-old woman asked her primary care doctor about something strange that began to occur with her hands:  Her fingers were cold and numb during the summer months. What's your diagnosis?

New research shows that a newly identified species of gut bacteria is significantly depleted in patients with ankylosing spondylitis.

High levels of comorbidity burden are associated independently with poor physical function and increased disability in patients with psoriatic arthritis, however, patients ankylosing spondylitis did not report worse function when comorbidities were present.

Fibromyalgia and polymyalgia rheumatica are distinctly different, but in a case report described in the May 8 issue of the American Journal of Case Reports, Fawad Aslam, M.D., of Mayo Clinic in Arizona, and colleagues describe a confusing case of a 30-year-old woman.

ACE inhibitors appear to heighten the risk of scleroderma renal crisis (SRC), a potentialy deadly complication in patients with systemic sclerosis.

Researchers writing in Arthritis and Rheumatology have found that some scleroderma patients carry enriched antibodies that may prevent cancer and provide immunity to other systemic sclerosis-associated conditions, such as scleroderma renal crisis and SSc-gastrointestinal disease.

The recommendation was based on the SENSCIS trial results, orginally shared at ATS 2019 this year.

Partial knee replacement should be considered first over total knee replacement for patients with late-stage isolated medial compartment knee osteoarthritis, say researchers writing in The Lancet this month.