Assessing and mitigating risk of infection in patients with multiple sclerosis on disease modifying treatment.

Assessing and mitigating risk of infection in patients with multiple sclerosis on disease modifying treatment. Expert Rev Clin Immunol. 2021 Feb 05;: Authors: Otero-Romero S, Sánchez-Montalvá A, Vidal-Jordana A Abstract INTRODUCTION: The important development that the multiple sclerosis (MS) treatment field has experienced in the last years comes along with the need of dealing with new adverse event such as the increase risk of infections. In the shared therapeutic decision-making process, the MS expert neurologist should also balance the risks of specific infections under each particular treatment and be familiar with new mitigation strategies. AREAS COVERED: In this review, the authors provide an up-to-date review of the infection risk associated with MS treatments with a specific focus on risk mitigating strategies. The search was conducted using Pubmed® database (2000 - present) to identify publications that reported infection rates and infection complications for each treatment (interferon beta, glatiramer acetate, teriflunomide, dimethyl fumarate, fingolimod, cladribine, natalizumab, alemtuzumab, rituximab, and ocrelizumab). EXPERT OPINION: Since the emergence of the first natalizumab-related PML case, the arrival of new MS therapies has come hand in hand with new infectious complications. MS-specialist neurologist has to face new challenges regarding the management of immunosuppression-related infectious com...
Source: Expert Review of Clinical Immunology - Category: Allergy & Immunology Tags: Expert Rev Clin Immunol Source Type: research