News

Simple hip motion tests and observing for pain during that motion were helpful in identifying patients most likely to have hip osteoarthritis on plain radiography, say researchers recently writing in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

In patients with seropositive rheumatoid arthritis, high-dose trivalent inactivated influenza vaccine (HD-TIV) is safe and more immunogenic than standard-dose quadrivalent influenza vaccine (SD-QIV), say researchers writing in The Lancet Rheumatology.

Probiotic supplementation using a mix of three Lactobacillus strains naturally occurring in the human gut microbiota protects against lumbar spine bone loss in healthy, early postmenopausal women, say researchers recently writing in The Lancet Rheumatology.

Compared with other antihypertensive medications, amlodipine was found to reduce risk of gout in older patients.

Probiotic supplementation using a mix of three Lactobacillus strains naturally occurring in the human gut microbiota protects against lumbar spine bone loss in healthy, early postmenopausal women, say researchers recently writing in The Lancet Rheumatology.

Apremilast (Otezla, Celgene) resulted in a greater reduction in the number of oral ulcers associated with Behçet’s syndrome than placebo, say researchers recently writing in the New England Journal of Medicine.

A diagnosis of hidradenitis suppurativa may precede the development of ankylosing spondylitis, psoriatic arthritis or rheumatoid arthritis in patients, say researchers writing in the January 22 issue of JAMA Dermatology.

The placebo response in clinical trials for rheumatoid arthritis appears to have grown over the last two decades with patients exhibiting significant improvements in pain scores with placebo treatment.

Treatment with the recently approved oral, selective JAK-1 inhibitor upadacitinib (Rinvoq, AbbVie) resulted in significant improvements in various patient-reported outcomes among individuals with rheumatoid arthritis who have had inadequate responses to biologic DMARDs, researchers report in Arthritis Research & Therapy.

Psoriatic arthritis patients with moderate disease activity were more likely to reach treatment targets or low disease activity at week 52 with apremilast (Otezla, Celgene) than patients with high disease activity, researchers report in the January 7 issue of Arthritis Care and Research.

Patients and doctors still haven't fully invested in the use of biosimilars, despite a steady rise in the cost of biologics, shows a new report by Harvard researchers. 

Patients with osteoarthritis participated in the development of the guideline updates for the first time ever.

The American College of Rheumatology (ACR), in partnership with the Arthritis Foundation, has issued treatment guidelines for osteoarthritis of the hand, hip and knee. This is the first update since 2012.

In patients with ankylosing spondylitis receiving treatment with non‐steroidal anti‐inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs), timely therapeutic strategies should be implemented in order to manage gastrointestinal risk, say researchers recently writing in the International Journal of Rheumatic Disease.

Secukinumab (Cosentyx, Novartis) provided sustained improvements through five years in the signs and symptoms of psoriatic arthritis with no new safety signals, say researchers recently writing in ACR Open Rheumatology.

Investigators identified 7 healthcare quality indicators, “the ideal clinical pathway,” for patients with rheumatoid arthritis to reduce the risk of birth complications.

A 62-year-old woman complained to her doctor about joint pain in her fingers. The joints in her fingers were warm, tender, and slightly swollen. Can you diagnose this patient?

A look back at the developments and interviews that caught the most attention this year.

Frailty score, age and C-reactive protein (CRP) are associated with mortality in elderly patients with anti-neutrophil cytoplasmic antibody (ANCA)-associated vasculitis, say researchers writing in Rheumatology this fall.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved rituximab (Rituxan, Genentech) for the treatment of granulomatosis with polyangiitis (GPA) and microscopic polyangiitis (MPA) in children 2 years of age and older in combination with glucocorticoids, to fulfil an unmet medical need for these rare and serious diseases in children.

Nearly one third of patients with systemic lupus erythematosus use prescription opioids, with around two thirds of those using opioids for more than a year, while emergency department use is associated with increased prescription opioid use, say researchers writing in Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report in Septmeber.

A Quality Improvement (QI) method called Lean A3 helped improve and sustain opioid prescribing within an ambulatory rheumatology clinic, say researchers writing in ACR Open Rheumatology last month.

Monosodium urate (MSU) deposits detected by dual-energy computed tomography (DECT) are common in patients with gout and are associated with higher coronary calcium scores, researchers recently reported in JAMA Cardiology.

The suggestion that DECT scans might add to our diagnostic ability to detect cardiac disease may be imprudent because we have tests at our disposal and have little need to increase diagnostic costs. Good clinical judgement, paying attention to traditional risk factors and to red flags, will increase the number of asymptomatic cardiac patients we choose to study with conventional methods.

Biologics, JAK inhibitors, and opioid alternatives all served major payoffs in the field in the 2010s.

Xcenda, an AmerisourceBergen company, has just published a white paper that demonstrates the prevalence of step therapy and its potential negative impact on rheumatology patients. The authors of the report say the practice doesn’t always have the best interest of patents in mind and payers don't entirely disagree. Learn more in this report.

How therapies are advancing treat-to-target strategies, while the field faces a physician shortage issue.

Intra-articular administration of sprifermin statistically increases total femorotibial joint cartilage thickness in individuals with symptomatic radiographic knee osteoarthritis, but the clinical importance and duration of the effect are uncertain, say researchers writing recently in JAMA.

Blood clots can cause critical or lethal problems in patients, and individuals with antiphospholipid syndrome can experience these events at any location in their bodies. However, there’s not a great deal of clarity on which risk factors are most significant for this condition. In this Q&A, we feature a conversation with Eileen J. Lydon, ANP-BC, a rheumatology nurse practitioner at New York University Langone Orthopedic Hospital, who recently spoke on recommendations for treating patients with antiphospholipid syndrome.

Among the most noteworthy in 2019:  Treatment of rheumatologic diseases with interleukin inhibitors may raise patients’ risks for serious and opportunistic infections and possibly also cancer, researchers reported in JAMA Network Open in October.