Clinical benefit of 1-year certolizumab pegol (CZP) add-on therapy to methotrexate treatment in patients with early rheumatoid arthritis was observed following CZP discontinuation: 2-year results of the C-OPERA study, a phase III randomised trial

Tatsuya Atsumi, Yoshiya Tanaka, Kazuhiko Yamamoto, Tsutomu Takeuchi, Hisashi Yamanaka, Naoki Ishiguro, Katsumi Eguchi, Akira Watanabe, Hideki Origasa, Shinsuke Yasuda, Yuji Yamanishi, Yasuhiko Kita, Tsukasa Matsubara, Masahiro Iwamoto, Toshiharu Shoji, Osamu Togo, Toshiyuki Okada, Désirée Van Der Heijde, Nobuyuki Miyasaka, Takao Koike

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    28 Citations (Scopus)

    Abstract

    Objectives To investigate the clinical impact of 1-year certolizumab pegol (CZP) therapy added to the first year of 2-year methotrexate (MTX) therapy, compared with 2-year therapy with MTX alone. Methods MTX-naïve patients with early rheumatoid arthritis (RA) with poor prognostic factors were eligible to enter Certolizumab-Optimal Prevention of joint damage for Early RA (C-OPERA), a multicentre, randomised, controlled study, which consisted of a 52-week double-blind (DB) period and subsequent 52-week post treatment (PT) period. Patients were randomised to optimised MTX+CZP (n=159) or optimised MTX+placebo (PBO; n=157). Following the DB period, patients entered the PT period, receiving MTX alone (CZP+MTX→MTX; n=108, PBO+MTX→MTX; n=71). Patients who flared could receive rescue treatment with open-label CZP. Results 34 CZP+MTX→MTX patients and 14 PBO+MTX→MTX patients discontinued during the PT period. From week 52 through week 104, significant inhibition of total modified total Sharp score progression was observed for CZP+MTX versus PBO+MTX (week 104: 84.2% vs 67.5% (p<0.001)). Remission rates decreased after CZP discontinuation; however, higher rates were maintained through week 104 in CZP+MTX→MTX versus PBO+MTX→MTX (41.5% vs 29.3% (p=0.026), 34.6% vs 24.2% (p=0.049) and 41.5% vs 33.1% (p=0.132) at week 104 in SDAI, Boolean and DAS28(erythrocyte sedimentation rate) remission. CZP retreated patients due to flare (n=28) showed rapid clinical improvement. The incidence of overall adverse events was similar between groups. Conclusions In MTX-naïve patients with early RA with poor prognostic factors, an initial 1 year of add-on CZP to 2-year optimised MTX therapy brings radiographic and clinical benefit through 2€...years, even after stopping CZP. Trial registration number NCT01451203.

    Original languageEnglish
    Pages (from-to)1348-1356
    Number of pages9
    JournalAnnals of the rheumatic diseases
    Volume76
    Issue number8
    DOIs
    Publication statusPublished - 2017 Aug 1

    Keywords

    • Anti-TNF
    • DMARDs (biologic)
    • Early Rheumatoid Arthritis
    • Methotrexate

    ASJC Scopus subject areas

    • Rheumatology
    • Immunology and Allergy
    • Immunology
    • Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology(all)

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