Safety and effectiveness of secukinumab in psoriasis vulgaris and psoriatic arthritis: Real‐world evidence in Japan

Secukinumab, a fully human monoclonal antibody that selectively neutralizes interleukin‐17A, has been available for the treatment of moderate to severe psoriasis and psoriatic arthritis since February 2015 in Japan. Because there was a time gap after the previous approval of biologics for psoriatic disease indication, it was suggested that patients to be treated with secukinumab at its launch might have refractory disease symptoms. In order to assess the safety and effectiveness of secukinumab in those patients, a 52‐week, open‐label, multicenter, observational cohort study was conducted. In total, 306 and 250 patients were included in the safety and effectiveness analysis sets, respectively. Over half of patients had previously received biologics (56.9%). Adverse events, serious adverse events and adverse reactions were reported in 41.2%, 7.2% and 24.2% of patients, respectively. The most commonly reported adverse reactions were oral candidiasis (2.9%), consistent with those reported in clinical studies. In addition, none of the patient characteristics assessed for the effect on safety of secukinumab increased the occurrence of adverse reactions. Psoriasis Area and Severity Index score (mean ± standard deviation) improved from baseline (14.7 ± 12.3) to week 12 (1.78 ± 3.3), which was maintained up to week 24 (1.59 ± 3.0). The proportion of patients with a Dermatology Life Quality Index score of 0/1 improved from baseline (2.2%) to week 12 (64.7%) and sustained up to week 24 (71.4%). In addition to the skin symptoms, improvement was observed in all psoriatic arthritis disease‐related assessments. The current study reaffirmed the safety and effectiveness of secukinumab with broader patients than those in the clinical studies.