Insurance delays in juvenile arthritis not impacted by private, public coverage

June 23, 2022

Children with juvenile idiopathic arthritis who require TNF inhibitors often experience insurance-led delays to therapy initiation, according to a research letter published in JAMA Network Open.
“Although insurance is associated with treatment delays in adults with rheumatoid arthritis, it is unknown if prior authorization (PA) requirements delay [TNF inhibitor (TNFi)] initiation among children with JIA,” Jordan E. Roberts, MD, of Boston Children’s Hospital, and colleagues wrote. “We aimed to characterize delays in TNFi initiation because of insurance among children

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Healio Rheumatology – Updates

Disease flares requiring therapy change ‘relatively uncommon’ after COVID-19 vaccination

Systemic rheumatic disease flares requiring therapy changes after COVID-19 vaccination appear to be uncommon, according to data published in Rheumatology.“We were interested in how patients with systemic rheumatic diseases would do after receiving COVID-19 vaccines, particularly in whether they experienced disease flares requiring a change in their therapies, and if there were any factors associated with disease flare in receiving these vaccines,” Lisa G. Rider, MD, the head of the environmental autoimmunity group in the clinical research branch of the NIH’s National
Molecular signature-assisted drug selection may improve results in rheumatoid arthritis

Molecular signature response classifier-assisted rheumatoid arthritis treatment selection may improve real-world results in patients with rheumatoid arthritis, according to data published in Expert Opinion on Biological Therapy.“This study reports the second interim analysis of the [Accelerate Information of Molecular Signatures (AIMS)] real-world study evaluating the clinical utility of the [molecular signature response classifier (MSRC)] test,” Vibeke Strand, MD, adjunct clinical professor at the division of immunology and rheumatology at the Stanford University School of
Patients with osteoarthritis who walk for exercise less likely to develop new knee pain

Walking for exercise appears to reduce pain progression in patients aged 50 years or older with knee osteoarthritis, according to data published in Arthritis & Rheumatology.“To conduct this study, we used data from the Osteoarthritis Initiative, a research endeavor that has been funded by the NIH and pharma partners for many years,” Grace H. Lo, MD, MSc, assistant professor of medicine at the Baylor College of Medicine, and chief of rheumatology and investigator at the Center for Innovations in Quality, Effectiveness and Safety at the Michael E. DeBakey VA Medical Center in
Safety in rheumatology, COVID-19 and Evusheld PreP: Where do you stand?

This month’s cover story features an illustrious faculty — Christina Charles-Schoeman, MD, MS; Kathryn Dao, MD; Roy Fleischmann, MD; Jon T. Giles, MD, MPH; and Grace C. Wright, MD, PhD — and highlights the evolution of safety in our field, a phenomenon profoundly influenced by our rich armamentarium of targeted therapies not even dreamed of when I started training.Treatments for rheumatic diseases a generation ago were nearly devoid of concerns for opportunistic infections. This changed when cyclophosphamide was introduced as standard of care for what we now know as