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- Elhai, M, et al.
(author)
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Outcomes of patients with systemic sclerosis treated with rituximab in contemporary practice: a prospective cohort study
- 2019
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In: Annals of the rheumatic diseases. - : BMJ. - 1468-2060 .- 0003-4967. ; 78:7, s. 979-987
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- To assess the safety and efficacy of rituximab in systemic sclerosis (SSc) in clinical practice.MethodsWe performed a prospective study including patients with SSc from the European Scleroderma Trials and Research (EUSTAR) network treated with rituximab and matched with untreated patients with SSc. The main outcomes measures were adverse events, skin fibrosis improvement, lung fibrosis worsening and steroids use among propensity score-matched patients treated or not with rituximab.Results254 patients were treated with rituximab, in 58% for lung and in 32% for skin involvement. After a median follow-up of 2 years, about 70% of the patients had no side effect. Comparison of treated patients with 9575 propensity-score matched patients showed that patients treated with rituximab were more likely to have skin fibrosis improvement (22.7 vs 14.03 events per 100 person-years; OR: 2.79 [1.47–5.32]; p=0.002). Treated patients did not have significantly different rates of decrease in forced vital capacity (FVC)>10% (OR: 1.03 [0.55–1.94]; p=0.93) nor in carbon monoxide diffusing capacity (DLCO) decrease. Patients having received rituximab were more prone to stop or decrease steroids (OR: 2.34 [1.56–3.53], p<0.0001). Patients treated concomitantly with mycophenolate mofetil had a trend for better outcomes as compared with patients receiving rituximab alone (delta FVC: 5.22 [0.83–9.62]; p=0.019 as compared with controls vs 3 [0.66–5.35]; p=0.012).ConclusionRituximab use was associated with a good safety profile in this large SSc-cohort. Significant change was observed on skin fibrosis, but not on lung. However, the limitation is the observational design. The potential stabilisation of lung fibrosis by rituximab has to be addressed by a randomised trial.
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| 3. |
- Becker, M, et al.
(author)
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Predictors of disease worsening defined by progression of organ damage in diffuse systemic sclerosis: a European Scleroderma Trials and Research (EUSTAR) analysis
- 2019
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In: Annals of the rheumatic diseases. - : BMJ. - 1468-2060 .- 0003-4967. ; 78:9, s. 1242-1248
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Mortality and worsening of organ function are desirable endpoints for clinical trials in systemic sclerosis (SSc). The aim of this study was to identify factors that allow enrichment of patients with these endpoints, in a population of patients from the European Scleroderma Trials and Research group database.MethodsInclusion criteria were diagnosis of diffuse SSc and follow-up over 12±3 months. Disease worsening/organ progression was fulfilled if any of the following events occurred: new renal crisis; decrease of lung or heart function; new echocardiography-suspected pulmonary hypertension or death. In total, 42 clinical parameters were chosen as predictors for the analysis by using (1) imputation of missing data on the basis of multivariate imputation and (2) least absolute shrinkage and selection operator regression.ResultsOf 1451 patients meeting the inclusion criteria, 706 had complete data on outcome parameters and were included in the analysis. Of the 42 outcome predictors, eight remained in the final regression model. There was substantial evidence for a strong association between disease progression and age, active digital ulcer (DU), lung fibrosis, muscle weakness and elevated C-reactive protein (CRP) level. Active DU, CRP elevation, lung fibrosis and muscle weakness were also associated with a significantly shorter time to disease progression. A bootstrap validation step with 10 000 repetitions successfully validated the model.ConclusionsThe use of the predictive factors presented here could enable cohort enrichment with patients at risk for overall disease worsening in SSc clinical trials.
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| 5. |
- Jerusalem, G, et al.
(author)
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Continuous versus intermittent extended adjuvant letrozole for breast cancer: Final results of randomized phase 3 SOLE (Study of Letrozole Extension) and SOLE Estrogen Substudy.
- 2021
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In: Annals of Oncology. - : Elsevier BV. - 0923-7534. ; 32:10, s. 1256-1266
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Late recurrences in postmenopausal women with hormone receptor-positive breast cancers remain an important challenge. Avoidance or delayed development of resistance represents the main objective in extended endocrine therapy. In animal models, resistance was reversed with restoration of circulating estrogen level during interruption of letrozole treatment. This phase 3 randomized, open-label Study of Letrozole Extension (SOLE) studied the effect of extended intermittent letrozole treatment in comparison with continuous letrozole. In parallel, the SOLE estrogen sub-study (SOLE-EST) analyzed the level of estrogen during the interruption of treatment.SOLE enrolled 4884 postmenopausal women with hormone receptor-positive, lymph node-positive, operable breast cancer between December 2007 and October 2012 and among them, 104 patients were enrolled in SOLE-EST. They must have undergone local treatment and have completed 4-6 years of adjuvant endocrine therapy. Patients were randomized between continuous letrozole (2.5 mg/day orally for 5 years) and intermittent letrozole treatment (2.5 mg/day during 9 months followed by a 3-month interruption in years 1-4 and then 2.5 mg/day during all year 5).Intention-to-treat population included 4851 women in SOLE (n=2425 in intermittent and n=2426 in continuous letrozole groups) and 103 women in SOLE-EST (n=78 in intermittent and n=25 in continuous letrozole groups). After a median follow-up of 84 months, 7-year disease-free survival was 81.4% in intermittent group and 81.5% in continuous group (hazard ratio: 1.03, 95%CI: 0.91-1.17). Reported adverse events were similar in both groups. Circulating estrogen recovery was demonstrated within 6 weeks after the stop of letrozole treatment.Extended adjuvant endocrine therapy by intermittent administration of letrozole did not improve disease-free survival compared to continuous use despite the recovery of circulating estrogen level. The similar disease-free survival coupled with previously reported quality-of-life advantages suggest intermittent extended treatment is a valid option for patients who require or prefer a treatment interruption.
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| 6. |
- Zitnik, M., et al.
(author)
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Interference of two-photon transitions induced by XUV light
- 2022
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In: Optica. - : Optica Publishing Group. - 2334-2536. ; 9:7, s. 692-700
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- The relative phase of first (omega(1)) and third harmonics (omega(3)) extreme ultraviolet light pulses was varied to control the population of the 2s(2) state in helium through the interference of omega(1) + omega(1) and omega(3) - omega(1) two-photon excitation paths. The population was monitored by observing the total electron yield due to the 2s(2) autoionization decay. Maximum yield occurs when the relative phase of the two harmonics matches the phase difference of complex atomic amplitudes governing the two excitation paths. The calculated trend of atomic phase differences agrees well with the measured data in the spectral region of the resonance, provided that time-reversed -omega(1) + omega(3) path is also taken into account. These results open the way to accessing phase differences of two-photon ionization paths involving energetically distant intermediate states and to perform interferometry in the extreme ultraviolet range by monitoring final state populations. (c) 2022 Optica Publishing Group under the terms of the Optica Open Access Publishing Agreement
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