Lloyd Miller, MD, PhD: Guselkumab Shows Great Efficacy Across all Psoriasis Populations

New data on the monoclonal antibody guselkumab (TREMFYA) showed greater efficacy than secukinumab (Cosentyx) in a majority of subpopulations of patients with moderate-to-severe psoriasis.

At week 48 of the study, a significant number of patients achieved at least 90% and 100% improvement from baseline in Psoriasis Area and Severity Index (PASI 90 and PASI 100) regardless of baseline age, body weight, disease severity, and prior medication.

In an interview with HCPLive, Lloyd Miller, MD, PhD, Vice President, Immunodermatology Disease Area Leader at Janssen, spoke on the efficacy of the biologic in relation to secukinumab, and how it improved disease severity on specific patient populations.

Despite recording high PASI scores across all patient populations, he noted that guselkumab was especially effective in older and larger patients.

“As you know, many drugs are affected by body weight," Miller said. "The more a patient weighs, the less effective (the drug). But, we saw TREMFYA was more effective than secukinumab in the patients weighing greater than 100 kilograms or about 220 pounds.”

Patients aged 65 years and older showed a greater clinical response to the biologic as well.

Miller noted that not every biologic works for individual patient populations with psoriasis, especially those with moderate-to-severe cases. Over the past 5 years, he has seen strong 5-year results with guselkumab in the VOYAGE 1 and 2 clinical trials.

Though some patient populations fared better, the results of the recent study showed how effective it could be across the board.

Miller stated that the biologic could possibly be used to treat pediatric patients in the future, with ongoing trials taking place for adolescents.

Though the recent trial focused mainly on older, Caucasian patients, Miller said Janssen is eager to incorporate more diverse populations in future studies.

“This is really important for Janssen, as we move forward not just with TREMFYA but in many of our other trials going forward, we are making extraordinary efforts to really recruit diverse ethnically and racially diverse patients in our trials,” Miller said.

To hear more about the recent data on guselkumab and what to anticipate in later trials, watch the video interview above.