Predictors of the efficacy of infliximab in patients with ulcerative colitis

Introduction. The currently known prognostic criteria for biological therapy have limitations and have not been widely used in clinical practice. Aim. Find predictors of the effectiveness of biological therapy with infliximab in patients with ulcerative colitis. Materials and methods. The object of the study was patients (n = 52) diagnosed with Ulcerative Colitis in the active form of the disease, including 27 men and 25 women undergoing therapy with infliximab. Follow-up was carried out for three years from the start of therapy. The age of the examined persons ranged from 19 to 64 years (mean age 34.76 ± 2.13 years). The mean score on the Mayo scale was 6.1 ± 3.49. Results. In the course of our study, we obtained the following data on the effectiveness of infliximab therapy in patients with severe ulcerative colitis: a significant improvement in the dynamics of laboratory and instrumental parameters was recorded in 25 people (43.8%); the onset of stable clinical remission — in 15 people (26.3%); disease progression — in 5 cases (8.7%); lack of dynamics or a less pronounced effect — in 12 cases (21.2%). Conclusions. We have identified a system of clinical and laboratory factors that make it possible to predict the effectiveness of biological therapy with infliximab in patients with ulcerative colitis. The mathematical model in the form of a discriminant function makes it possible to divide patients into groups depending on the possible effect of the use of biological therapy with infliximab before its initiation (the sensitivity of the model is 83.3%, the specificity is 71.4%).