FRIDAY, March 15, 2024 (HealthDay News) -- Patients with psoriasis treated with bimekizumab rapidly achieve high levels of clinical and health-related quality-of-life responses that are durable at four years, according to research presented at the annual meeting of the American Academy of Dermatology, held from March 8 to 12 in San Diego.
Bruce Strober, M.D., Ph.D., from the Yale School of Medicine in New Haven, Connecticut, and colleagues evaluated pooled data from three randomized, phase 3 trials and their open-label extension (OLE) trial (52-week BE VIVID, 56-week BE SURE and BE READY, and OLE BE BRIGHT) to determine the efficacy of responses to bimekizumab through four years of treatment among patients with moderate-to-severe plaque psoriasis. Patients had been randomly assigned to bimekizumab 320 mg every four weeks to week 16, received bimekizumab every four or eight weeks thereafter, and entered the OLE.
The researchers found that among 771 patients who received bimekizumab continuously from baseline and entered the OLE, 90.9, 65.8, 78.5, and 71.5 percent, respectively, achieved Psoriasis Area and Severity Index (PASI) ≥90 percent improvement from baseline (PASI90), PASI 100 percent improvement (PASI100), body surface area (BSA) ≤1 percent, and Dermatology Life Quality Index 0/1 (DLQI0/1) at week 16. Durability of the responses was maintained at four years: 86.1, 64.7, 79.8, and 78.7 percent of patients achieved PASI90, PASI100, BSA ≤1 percent, and DLQI0/1, respectively.
"Analysis shows that through four years of bimekizumab treatment, over six out of 10 patients achieved and maintained complete skin clearance, a clinically meaningful end point and outcome for patients," Strober said in a statement. "These long-term data will be highly welcomed by the dermatology community since they provide important considerations for clinical practice."
Several authors disclosed ties to biopharmaceutical companies, including UCB Pharma, which manufactures bimekizumab and funded the study.