[Biologic therapies different from the anti-TNFα therapy in psoriasis and psoriatic arthritis]

Psoriasis and psoriatic arthritis (PsA) are common conditions in the clinical practice of both dermatologists and rheumatologists. Both entities may cause an important loss in quality of life, and in the case of PsA, joint structural damage may arise over time. For these reasons, clinicians may be faced with the need for treating these cases with highly effective therapies, such as TNFα blocking agents, although these drugs may be paradoxically related with de novo onset (or exacerbation of previous lesions) of psoriasis or psoriasiform lesions. In spite of the clinical efficacy of these therapies, recent registry studies show that up to 25% of PsA cases exposed to anti-TNF therapies are withdrawn from these drugs within the first year of therapy. Therefore, there is a need for the use of alternative biologic therapies in this context. The present review deals with this subject.