Key clinical point: Patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) receiving interleukin-6 inhibition (IL-6i) therapy with or without T-cell inhibitors had a significantly lower risk for type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) vs those receiving tumor necrosis factor inhibitors (TNFi) or not receiving any biological disease-modifying antirheumatic drugs (bDMARDs).
Major finding: Compared with patients not receiving bDMARDs, those who received IL-6i and IL-6i+T-cell inhibitors had a significant 37% (hazard ratio [HR], 0.63; P = .021) and 34% (HR, 0.66; P = .019) lower risk for T2DM, respectively, whereas no significant difference was observed among patients receiving TNFi (HR, 0.99; P = .26) and T-cell inhibitors (HR, 0.96; P = .37).
Study details: This was a retrospective cohort study of 283,756 patients with RA categorized as bDMARD recipients (TNFi, n=34,873; IL-6i, n=1,884; T-cell inhibitors, n=5,935; and IL-6i+T-cell inhibitor abatacept, n=1,213) and non-bDMARD recipients (n=125,337).
Disclosures: This study was supported by Roche/Genentech. The principal author reported receiving grants, consultancy, and/or speaker fees from various sources. JH Best, S Gale, and K Sarsour reported being employees of Genentech.
Source: Paul SK et al. BMJ Open. 2021 Jun 16. doi: 10.1136/bmjopen-2020-042246 .