UCB, a Belgium-based biopharmaceutical company, has announced the results from a Phase III double-blind placebo-controlled RAPID 1 post-hoc analysis designed to evaluate the efficacy and tolerability of Cimzia (certolizumab pegol) plus methotrexate in treating rheumatoid arthritis.
Cimzia, a PEGylated anti-tumour necrosis factor (TNF), neutralises the pathophysiological effects of TNF-alpha.
The data suggested that disease activity response rates to Cimzia plus methotrexate as early as week 12 helped predict the effect on structural joint damage in patients with moderate to severe rheumatoid arthritis at one year.
Both Routine Assessment of Patient Index Data (RAPID3) and European League Against Rheumatism (EULAR) data suggested that either response criteria could be used as predictors of structural joint damage in patients with moderate to severe rheumatoid arthritis..
The RAPID3 patient-derived assessment of disease activity was found to correlate with disease activity score, DAS28, in patients treated with Cimzia.
