Romatoid Artrit’in Yeni Zemin Tedaviler
Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is one of the most common rheumatic diseases. Use of methotrexate in the treatment of RA in 1990’s opened a new era in the treatment of this disease. However, with time it was understood that this treatment was inadequate on inducing clinical remission and lacks chondroprotective effect. In that case, it seemed necessary to find more effective strategies in relieving the clinical symptoms and in the prevention of osteocartilaginous lesions. Under these conditions, better understanding of the pathologic and immunopathologic mechanisms in RA provided new approaches in the treatment of the disease. These new treatments were symbolized by immunomodulators and biologic agents. The problem is to decide which treatment is appropriate in what conditions, because of their high costs. Although these are the therapeutic agents in the 2000’s, radical treatment of RA still remains to be defined. We will present the new agents, leflunamide and TNF µ modulators which have been used since 2000
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