New Rheumatoid Arthritis Drug RoActerma Shows Incredible Results
RoActemra is a miracle drug! The first of its kind in a decade, RoActemra is a drug used to treat adults with moderate or severe active rheumatoid arthritis (RA). The drug is also used for babies as young as 18 month old with systemic juvenile arthritis [active juvenile idiopathic arthritis (SJIA)]. Now, RoActemra is an international phenomenon.
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved RoActemra (tocilizumab; known as Actemra in the United States) for marketing in the United States on January 11, 2010, and at around the same time the drug became available in Scotland. The National Health Society (NHS) and the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) of Britain recently approved RoActemra in England and Wales as a €last resort€ treatment for RA sufferers who have failed on standard prescribed treatments. Until RoActemra's discovery, patients for whom the available treatments failed were left with no choice but to suffer. €We are delighted with NICE's decision as there are so many patients with rheumatoid arthritis in need of tighter disease management,€ said chief executive of England's National Rheumatoid Arthritis Society, Ailsa Bosworth.
John Isaacs MBBS,BSc,PhD,FRCP, professor of clinical rheumatology at Newcastle University in the UK explained, €Rheumatoid arthritis is an unrelenting disease and it is vital that patients have options available to them when they are no longer responding to, or can no longer tolerate, their current treatment€¦ We have evidence that if you can stop the disease early, you can change the way it progresses for the rest of the patient's life. This is particularly important when it strikes at a young age.€
Patients with rheumatoid arthritis have an amplified amount of interleukin-6, a protein of the immune system. RoActemra helps to alleviate the fatigue, swollen joints and joint pain by blocking the harmful exploits of this protein. About 50% of the patients currently taking RoActemra in a rheumatoid arthritis clinical trial in England are in remission and nearly all of them experience no symptoms. The drug's rate of patient remission is six times higher than that of methotrexate, a commonly prescribed drug for RA patients.
Dr. Isaacs explained, €There are now several biologics used to treat RA. The first to be developed were the anti-TNFs (Remicade, Enbrel, Humira and, most recently, Cimzia and Simponi)€¦ Other biologic drugs include Mabthera, which kills B-cells and Orencia, which targets T-cells, two important cell types in RA. RoActemra therefore targets a different aspect of the immune response in RA than other biologic drugs.€
About 400,000 in England and Wales have RA and about 50% of these people are unable to work with their disabilities within ten years of diagnosis. 75% of these RA patients are women. Only about 1,200 patients with advanced RA take RoActemra. With NICE's approval of the drug, about 40,000 more patients will be eligible for RoActemra prescriptions to be taken either alone or alongside their other RA medications.
Side effects of RoActemra include headache, upper respiratory tract infection, low platelet count, low neutrophil count, hepatitis B infection becoming an active infection, nervous system complications and inflammation of the nose or nasal passage. Patients who simultaneously take immunosuppressant drugs such as methotrexate or corticosteroids are at risk of developing serious infections such as tuberculosis and infections caused by bacteria or fungi. Since RoActemra works on the immune system, there is an increased risk of developing certain cancers.
There is hope for RA patients after all. With RoActemra, paients can expect to feel less joint pain and a reduction in fatigue. With RoActemra, RA patients can live more active lives with more vigor and optimism.
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved RoActemra (tocilizumab; known as Actemra in the United States) for marketing in the United States on January 11, 2010, and at around the same time the drug became available in Scotland. The National Health Society (NHS) and the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) of Britain recently approved RoActemra in England and Wales as a €last resort€ treatment for RA sufferers who have failed on standard prescribed treatments. Until RoActemra's discovery, patients for whom the available treatments failed were left with no choice but to suffer. €We are delighted with NICE's decision as there are so many patients with rheumatoid arthritis in need of tighter disease management,€ said chief executive of England's National Rheumatoid Arthritis Society, Ailsa Bosworth.
John Isaacs MBBS,BSc,PhD,FRCP, professor of clinical rheumatology at Newcastle University in the UK explained, €Rheumatoid arthritis is an unrelenting disease and it is vital that patients have options available to them when they are no longer responding to, or can no longer tolerate, their current treatment€¦ We have evidence that if you can stop the disease early, you can change the way it progresses for the rest of the patient's life. This is particularly important when it strikes at a young age.€
Patients with rheumatoid arthritis have an amplified amount of interleukin-6, a protein of the immune system. RoActemra helps to alleviate the fatigue, swollen joints and joint pain by blocking the harmful exploits of this protein. About 50% of the patients currently taking RoActemra in a rheumatoid arthritis clinical trial in England are in remission and nearly all of them experience no symptoms. The drug's rate of patient remission is six times higher than that of methotrexate, a commonly prescribed drug for RA patients.
Dr. Isaacs explained, €There are now several biologics used to treat RA. The first to be developed were the anti-TNFs (Remicade, Enbrel, Humira and, most recently, Cimzia and Simponi)€¦ Other biologic drugs include Mabthera, which kills B-cells and Orencia, which targets T-cells, two important cell types in RA. RoActemra therefore targets a different aspect of the immune response in RA than other biologic drugs.€
About 400,000 in England and Wales have RA and about 50% of these people are unable to work with their disabilities within ten years of diagnosis. 75% of these RA patients are women. Only about 1,200 patients with advanced RA take RoActemra. With NICE's approval of the drug, about 40,000 more patients will be eligible for RoActemra prescriptions to be taken either alone or alongside their other RA medications.
Side effects of RoActemra include headache, upper respiratory tract infection, low platelet count, low neutrophil count, hepatitis B infection becoming an active infection, nervous system complications and inflammation of the nose or nasal passage. Patients who simultaneously take immunosuppressant drugs such as methotrexate or corticosteroids are at risk of developing serious infections such as tuberculosis and infections caused by bacteria or fungi. Since RoActemra works on the immune system, there is an increased risk of developing certain cancers.
There is hope for RA patients after all. With RoActemra, paients can expect to feel less joint pain and a reduction in fatigue. With RoActemra, RA patients can live more active lives with more vigor and optimism.