Nearly one quarter (24.3%) of patients with moderate-to-severe plaque psoriasis treated with secukinumab discontinued due to an adverse event, according to interim analysis from the ongoing SERENA study. Patients had received the fully human monoclonal antibody for at least 16 weeks prior to enrollment; however, the researchers found relatively low rates of major adverse cardiovascular event (incidence rate [IR]: 0.37), inflammatory bowel disease (IR:0.15), and candida infections (IR:1.43).

   Researchers analyzed treatment retention for 1756 patients enrolled between October 2016 and October 2018 who were observed for at least 2 years. These data are being presented at the 2022 American Academy of Dermatology (AAD) Annual Meeting. However, data with a later cut-off date will also be presented at the meeting.

“In line with the secukinumab high body weight dosing study, these results highlight the importance of considering patients’ individual characteristics, such as body weight, in treatment decisions in order to optimize long-term outcome,” wrote lead author Matthias Augustin MD, PhD, University Medical Center Hamburg, and co-authors.

SERENA is a large, ongoing, longitudinal, observational study conducted at 438 sites across Europe for an expected duration of up to 5 years in adult patients. In addition to psoriasis, some patients had psoriatic arthritis and/or ankylosing spondylitis.

Treatment retention rates after 1, 2 and 3 years in the study were 88%, 76.4% and 60.5%. Out of the 648 patients who discontinued secukinumab treatment during the study, the most common reasons provided included lack of efficacy (42.6%), adverse event (17.4%) and physician decision (12.2%).

Of those patients weighing less than 90 kg, 17.4% discontinued due to adverse event, compared with 12.7% of those weighing 90 kg or more.

Reference
Augustin M, von Kiedrowski R, Rigopoulos D, et al. Secukinumab demonstrated sustained retention and safety in a real-world setting in patients with moderate to severe plaque psoriasis: long-term results from an interim analysis of the SERENA study. Poster presented at: AAD Annual Meeting; March 25-29, 2022; Boston, MA.