Brain functional magnetic resonance activity is associated with response to tumor necrosis factor inhibition

Simple SummaryContent extracted from patent full text and abstract with AI.

This invention relates to a non-invasive method for predicting whether a person with an inflammatory disease, such as rheumatoid arthritis, will respond favorably to anti-inflammatory therapies, particularly tumor necrosis factor (TNF) inhibitors. By using brain imaging techniques like functional MRI (fMRI) or PET scans, the method measures brain activity related to pain perception before starting treatment. The change in brain activity during a standardized control (like finger tapping) and a mild painful stimulus (like joint compression) is used to calculate a value that helps predict if a patient will benefit from TNF inhibitor therapy.

Use CasesContent extracted from patent full text and abstract with AI.

• Pre-treatment screening of rheumatoid arthritis patients to identify likely responders to TNF inhibitor therapies.
• Personalized treatment planning for inflammatory diseases (e.g., psoriatic arthritis, spondyloarthritis, inflammatory bowel disease) by predicting therapeutic response.
• Optimizing healthcare resources by avoiding ineffective, expensive, and potentially risky treatments in patients unlikely to benefit.
• Improving clinical trial selection by enrolling patients with a higher probability of benefiting from the therapy being investigated.
• Guiding patient counseling and shared decision-making in the management of chronic inflammatory diseases.

BenefitsContent extracted from patent full text and abstract with AI.

• Non-invasive and objective pre-treatment prediction of therapeutic response, reducing the reliance on costly and potentially harmful trial-and-error approaches.
• Enables personalized medicine, increasing the chance of treatment success and minimizing unnecessary exposure to drugs with side effects.
• Can save healthcare systems significant resources by avoiding ineffective treatments and targeting expensive biologics to responders.
• Improves patient quality of life by rapidly identifying optimal therapy with less delay.
• Provides new insights into the link between central nervous system pain perception and the effectiveness of anti-inflammatory therapies.

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Patent Abstract

The present invention relates to a non-invasive method for predicting the responsiveness of a human subject suffering from inflammatory disease to a treatment with a therapy against said inflammatory disease using brain imaging techniques. Furthermore, the present invention relates to a pharmaceutical composition comprising an active ingredient for the treatment of human subjects suffering from inflammatory disease and being identified as responders to therapy against the inflammatory disease according to the method of the invention. Preferably, this invention relates to a non-invasive method for predicting the responsiveness of a human subject suffering from rheumatoid arthritis to a treatment with TNF-antagonists comprising at least one step of brain imaging, preferably with an fMRI apparatus. The present invention shows that response to TNFi depends on the gestalt of brain activity in rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients.