Wrapping It Up ...

Last week Celgene denied my doctor's request to allow me to add Methotrexate to my protocol.  As I was not seeing improvement - especially with the psoriasis portion on my disease, I withdrew from the trial.

This diptic to the left is my left forearm at the beginning and the end of the trial and is fairly representative of the results on the rest of my body.  Am glad I photo-documented this, because I would not have remembered the size of my plaques at the beginning of the study.  As you can see, there was a significant size increase in this plaque.  The rounded plaque at the center engulfed the smaller plaque to the upper right of it.  Below this plaque, you can see the significant amount of space between it and the plaque at my elbow.  In the ending picture on the right, note the thin gap of unaffected skin between the enlarged forearm plaque and and my elbow.

My doctor has seen a lot of success with other patients, but many of them were already taking Methotrexate when they began the Apremilast trial and were able to take it as a part of a combo therapy.  I had stopped taking Methotrexate several months before when I got pneumonia.  In hindsight, I probably should have started it again prior to entering the trial and I would have been able to enter the trial doing combo therapy.

Why Celgene does not permit individuals to start combo therapy at 24 weeks and track those results, is beyond me.  If someone out there (including Celgene) knows a reason for this - please post it as a response here.  I would very much like to understand the rationale.

So, on to the next protocol ... for now, I'm supposed to be back on Methotrexate and folic acid - but last week I came down with a cold/sinus infection, so I'm not going to do anything until I'm fully recovered.  The plan is to do a combo therapy of MTX and Symponi - a once a month injectable.  I know there are quite a few new drugs in the pipeline, including a current RA drug that is being tested for PA and I'm hoping to have even more options in the coming months and years.

When I start my MTX and Symponi protocol (hopefully within the next two weeks), I will document my progess here (even though neither of these drugs is in clinical trials), hoping to provide more information for my fellow psoriasis and psoriatic arthritis sufferers.

Until then, flake on and stay moisturized!