Updates on Rheumatoid Arthritis: From Diagnosis to Treatment

Dear Colleagues,

Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is an inflammatory autoimmune disease, causing symmetrical polyarthritis, typically resulting in swollen, stiff and painful joints. This condition affects approximatelly 5 in every 1000 adults worldwide. The pharmacological treatment of RA should start as soon as the diagnosis is made. Methotrexate is an effective conventional synthetic (cs) disease-modifying antirheumatic drug (DMARD) and it is the first-line treatment option. If the disease activity remains moderate to high, additional treatment with csDMARDs, biological DMARDs (bDMARDs) or targeted synthetic DMARDs (tsDMARDs) should be considered.

New treatments for RA have been introduced over the last few years, like Janus-Kinase (JAK) inhibitors or interleukin-6 (IL-6) inhibitors, which have demonstrated effectiveness in controlling the disease. Nonetheless, safety issues have also been recently identified, delaying or inhibiting the approval of new drugs.

There are agents being currently developed for RA treatment, like those targeting CD40 and CD40 ligand, programmed death protein 1 (PD-1), or granulocyte-macrophage colony-stimulating factor (GM-CSF).

The current Special Issue will focus on updated research addressing the effectiveness and safety of pharmacological alternatives for RA, aiming to improve the knowledge about clinical management and patients’ outcomes in the field.

Dr. Carlos Alves
Guest Editor

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