Clinical Consequences of Antibody Formation, Serum Concentrations, and HLA-Cw6 Status in Psoriasis Patients on Ustekinumab.

Background: Ustekinumab for the treatment of psoriasis is currently administered in a standard dosing regimen. However, some patients tend to benefit from alternative dosing regimens, a step toward personalized medicine.

Methods: To investigate the role of ustekinumab serum concentrations, anti-ustekinumab antibodies [AUA] and HLA-Cw6 status as tools for optimizing ustekinumab treatment, a multicenter prospective cohort study was conducted at an academic hospital with affiliated nonacademic hospitals in Belgium (cohort 1) and 2 academic hospitals in the Netherlands (cohort 2 and 3).

Effectiveness of Biologic and Conventional Systemic Therapies in Adults with Chronic Plaque Psoriasis in Daily Practice: A Systematic Review.

The efficacy of biologic or conventional systemic therapies for psoriasis has been shown in randomized controlled trials. Effectiveness, however, has been studied in daily practice cohorts, and no aggregation of effectiveness data is available. This systematic review searched PubMed and EMBASE and summarized the real-world evidence on effectiveness of biologics (adalimumab, etanercept, infliximab and ustekinumab) and conventional systemic therapies (acitretin, cyclosporine, fumarates and methotrexate) for the treatment of plaque psoriasis in adults.

Combined use of systemic agents for psoriasis: a systematic review.

Importance: Combined use of systemic agents may be necessary to achieve disease control in therapy-resistant patients. However, to our knowledge, an overview of evidence, including quality assessments, is not yet available, and no guidance on monitoring, contraindications, and interactions exists.

Objectives: To summarize and critically appraise the evidence on efficacy and safety of combination therapy with systemic agents in plaque-type psoriasis.

Parental experiences with propranolol versus oral corticosteroids for complicated infantile hemangioma, a retrospective questionnaire study.

Background: Infantile hemangiomas (IHs) are common and mostly emerge in the head-neck area. Recently, propranolol has been replacing oral corticosteroids (OCS) as the main treatment modality.

Objectives: The aim of this study was to explore the impact of treatment, contentment with treatment outcome and quality of life for families and patients with cervicofacial IHs, treated with propranolol versus OCS.

Effectiveness of adalimumab dose escalation, combination therapy of adalimumab with methotrexate, or both in patients with psoriasis in daily practice.

Background: To increase effectiveness of standard adalimumab treatment 40 mg every other week (EOW) for patients with psoriasis, dose escalation to 40 mg every week or addition of methotrexate (MTX) are possible strategies.

Methods: Daily practice data about adalimumab treatment were extracted from a prospective observational cohort. We analyzed all patients with insufficient efficacy of adalimumab EOW who received 1) adalimumab dose escalation, 2) addition of MTX to adalimumab EOW, or 3) both.

[A woman with skin abnormalities around the mouth].

A 33-year-old healthy woman consulted her dermatologist when an acute and painful perioral pustular dermatosis erupted one day after she had taken azitromycin for a throat infection. A preliminary diagnosis of acute localized exanthematous pustulosis (ALEP) was made, which was later confirmed by cultures and histopathological examination. Medication was cessated immediately and the dermatosis disappeared completely afterwards.

The psychosocial impact of an infantile haemangioma on children and their parents.

Infantile haemangiomas (IHs) are common, benign vascular tumours in children that appear soon after birth and regress before the age of 12 years. Physicians have always been concerned about the considerable psychosocial impact these lesions might have on children and their parents. This is the first critical review of studies on the psychosocial impact of IHs on children and their families.