Psoriasis Patients Treated With Biologics and Methotrexate Have a Reduced Rate of Myocardial Infarction

Abstract

Psoriasis is a chronic inflammatory skin condition characterised by the formation of red scaly plaques on the skin. It is an autoimmune disease cause by the dysregulation of cytokines controlling the inflammatory pathways, a mechanism likely contributing to various comorbidities observed in patients with psoriasis. Cardiovascular disease is one comorbidity observed more frequently in the psoriasis patient population. Biologic treatments specifically target the dysregulation of cytokines in the inflammation pathway and have shown to be an effective treatment for moderate to severe psoriasis where other systemic treatments have failed. More recently, biologics have been shown to reduce the incidence of myocardial infarction in patients with psoriasis compared to patients treated with topical agents. In the present study, 4 international psoriasis patient cohorts are combined and analyzed to examine the effect that biologic or methotrexate treatment has on reducing the incidence of myocardial infarction. Both methotrexate and biologic treatments were found to lower the incidence of myocardial infarction in moderate to severe psoriasis patient populations.