Background and importance Anti-interleukin-17 (IL-17) drugs are a new option for treating patients with psoriasis which have demonstrated high efficacy in clinical trials.

Aim and objectives To analyse the effectiveness of anti-IL-17 drugs for psoriasis in clinical practice.

Material and methods A cross sectional study was conducted in two regional hospitals with a total of 196 biologic treatments (BT) for psoriasis. Inclusion criteria were patients in active treatment for at least 12 weeks with an anti-IL-17 drug (secukinumab or ixekizumab) for psoriasis until October 2019. Data collected included patient characteristics, type of psoriasis, previous and actual treatment, effectiveness measured by the psoriasis area severity index (PASI) and the impact on quality of life measured by the dermatology life quality index (DLQI). Statistical analysis was carried out with SPSS Statistics V.22. Results are presented as mean (SD) for quantitative data and percentages for qualitative data.

Results Thirty patients were included in the study (15.3% of the total BT for psoriasis in both hospitals), 16 (53.3%) of whom were men, and mean age was 50.2 (13.6) years.

Distribution by types of psoriasis: 30 (100.0%) plaque, 7 (23.3%) nail, 6 (20.0%) palmoplantar, 6 (20.0%) scalp and 2 (6.6%) inverse psoriasis. Thirteen (43.3%) patients had more than one type.

Distribution by treatment: 23 (76.7%) secukinumab and 7 (23.3%) ixekizumab. Twenty-three (76.7%) patients had received at least one systemic agent, which was usually methotrexate (69.6%), followed by acitretin (26.1%) and ciclosporin (4.4%). Moreover, for 13 (43.3%) patients, the anti-IL-17 drug was the first BT, while in 17 (56.7%) there had been another BT previously. Two (6.7%) patients had previously received an anti-IL-17 drug, which in both cases was secukinumab. Effectiveness is shown in table 1.

Twenty-two (73.3%) patients achieved a PASI of 90 (almost complete clearance of psoriatic lesions) and 24 (80.0%) had a DLQI ≤1 (no impact on quality of life) within 12 weeks of treatment. No significant differences in previous and actual PASI and DLQI were found between secukinumab and ixekizumab.

Conclusion and relevance

• More than half of the patients had more than only plaque psoriasis.

• Most patients had been treated previously with one systemic treatment.

• Anti–IL–17 drugs were effective in clinical practice.

• There were no differences between secukinumab and ixekizumab in terms of effectiveness.

References and/or acknowledgements No conflict of interest.