Rapid Response to Certolizumab Pegol in Hidradenitis Suppurativa: A Case Report

Hidradenitis suppurativa (HS) is a chronic inflammatory skin disease of hair follicles which usually affects patients' quality of life negatively. Although there are various therapeutic approaches including topical and systemic antibiotics, retinoids, biological agents, and also surgical modalities, there is no curative treatment option and clinical management of HS is still challenging.

Herein, we present a 43 year-old man with HS who had used different treatments in 15 years. The patient showed improvement initially with adalimumab, then exhibited secondary unresponsiveness after 18 months. While worsening of HS was recorded due to increased discharge under secukinumab, no additional benefit was observed with methotrexate. He was not willing to undergo surgical procedures due to previous surgical experience. Finally, certolizumab pegol has been started to patient with similar dosing to psoriasis patients. Sartorius, 10-point visual analogue scale (VAS), and dermatological life quality index (DLQI) scores regressed from 171 to 105, 9/10 to 3/10, and 27 to 19 after 3 months with certolizumab pegol treatment.

Certolizumab pegol is a humanized antigen-binding fragment of a monoclonal antibody which binds to TNF-alpha. However, certolizumab pegol is only approved for plaque psoriasis in dermatology; it is likely to be a promising effective agent for HS, especially in challenging cases.