Wyeth: Enbrel benefits arthritis patients in combination therapy

Wyeth has revealed new data regarding Enbrel, its treatment for rheumatoid arthritis.

The company found that many patients could benefit by adding Enbrel to the standard treatment of methotrexate. Wyeth found that patients who took Enbrel and methotrexate for demonstrated a “clinical improvement”. Half of patients who took both drugs for four years effectively achieved clinical remission, according to the study’s endpoint, compared to 38.7 per cent after three years.

Additionally, 74 achieved a level of the disease defined as “low disease activity” after four years, in comparison to 66.7 per cent after three years. Patients who had been treated with methotrexate for three years, but still suffered from moderate rheumatoid arthritis, showed an improvement in response when they switched to the combination therapy with Enbrel.

Dr Stevo Knezevic, chief medical officer of Wyeth Europe, remarked: “These results clearly show rheumatoid arthritis patients on methotrexate or Enbrel monotherapy may benefit from treatment with the combination of Enbrel and methotrexate.”

“It is important that health care providers make these therapies available as quickly as possible for appropriate patients,” he added.

According to the UK’s National Rheumatoid Arthritis Society, the disease afflicts 0.8 per cent of the UK’s adult population. It is described as “incredibly painful” and it can progress rapidly in a systemic nature, meaning it can affect the entire body and even internal organs because it is an auto-immune disease not necessarily restricted to the body’s joints.

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