Real-world outcomes for a complete nationwide cohort of more than 3200 teriflunomide-treated multiple sclerosis patients in The Danish Multiple Sclerosis Registry

Viktoria Papp*, Mathias Due Buron, Volkert Siersma, Peter Vestergaard Rasmussen, Zsolt Illes, Matthias Kant, Claudia Hilt, Zsolt Mezei, Homayoun Roshanisefat, Tobias Sejbaek, Arkadiusz Weglewski, Janneke van Wingerden, Svend Sparre Geertsen, Stephan Bramow, Finn Sellebjerg, Melinda Magyari

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalJournal articleResearchpeer-review

14 Citations (Scopus)
28 Downloads (Pure)

Abstract

Objective Teriflunomide is a once-daily, oral disease-modifying therapy (DMT) for relapsing forms of multiple sclerosis (MS). We studied clinical outcomes in a real-world setting involving a population-based large cohort of unselected patients enrolled in The Danish Multiple Sclerosis Registry (DMSR) who started teriflunomide treatment between 2013-2019.

Methods This was a complete nationwide population-based cohort study with prospectively enrolled unselected cases. Demographic and disease-specific patient parameters related to treatment history, efficacy outcomes, and discontinuation and switching rates among other clinical variables were assessed at baseline and during follow-up visits.

Results A total of 3239 patients (65.4% female) started treatment with teriflunomide during the study period, 56% of whom were treatment-naive. Compared to previously treated patients, treatment-naive patients were older on average at disease onset, had a shorter disease duration, a lower Expanded Disability Status Scale score at teriflunomide treatment start and more frequently experienced a relapse in the 12 months prior to teriflunomide initiation. In the 3001 patients initiating teriflunomide treatment at least 12 months before the cut-off date, 72.7% were still on treatment one year after treatment start. Discontinuations in the first year were due mainly to adverse events (15.6%). Over the full follow-up period, 47.5% of patients discontinued teriflunomide treatment. Sixty-three percent of the patients treated with teriflunomide for 5 years were relapse-free, while significantly more treatment-naive versus previously treated patients experienced a relapse during the follow-up (p

Conclusions Solid efficacy and treatment persistence data consistent with other real-world studies were obtained over the treatment period. Treatment outcomes in this real-world scenario of the population-based cohort support previous findings that teriflunomide is an effective and generally well-tolerated DMT for relapsing MS patients with mild to moderate disease activity.

Original languageEnglish
Article number0250820
JournalPLoS ONE
Volume16
Issue number5
Number of pages16
ISSN1932-6203
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2021

Keywords

  • DISEASE-MODIFYING THERAPIES
  • ORAL TERIFLUNOMIDE
  • RELAPSING FORMS
  • TREATMENT DECISIONS
  • REPORTED OUTCOMES
  • DOUBLE-BLIND
  • TRIAL
  • TOWER
  • AGE

Cite this