Itolizumab – A New Biologic for Management of Psoriasis and Psoriatic Arthritis

Psoriasis is a chronic, relapsing, inflammatory, immune-mediated systemic disease with mainly skin and joint manifestations. The available treatment options to cure psoriasis include topical therapy, phototherapy, and biological therapy. Biological therapy has become a promising option due to the rapid action and less adverse effects associated with its use. The newly developed biologic itolizumab is a humanized recombinant anti-CD6 monoclonal antibody of IgG1 isotype that binds to domain 1 of CD6, thereby immunomodulating human lymphocytes without interfering with the binding of CD6 to the activated leukocyte-cell adhesion molecule. In this case series, a total of 5 patients with chronic plaque psoriasis were treated with itolizumab. They exhibited a rapid PASI 75 response after 4 doses of itolizumab infusion. The patients were poor responders to methotrexate and/or cyclosporine therapy for a long time. All infusions were well tolerated by all patients with no adverse reactions or infections during the treatment period. Itolizumab can be a good option for management of psoriasis and psoriatic arthritis

Peripheral T cell lymphoma: Not otherwise specified

Peripheral T cell lymphoma (PTCL) is a heterogeneous group of hematological tumors originating from mature T cells, which constitutes less than 15% of all non-Hodgkins lymphomas in adults. Primary cutaneous PTCL-not otherwise specified (NOS) represent a subgroup of PTCLs with no consistent immunophenotypic, genetic or clinical features. PTCL-NOS frequently has an aggressive course with a tendency for systemic involvement, however, a well-defined therapeutic and prognostic approach has not been outlined yet. We report a case of PTCL-NOS with multiple cutaneous lesions in a young adult male with an emphasis on the treatment modality used

Open Letter to The American Association for the Advancement of Science

This is an open letter concerning the recent launch of the new open access journal, Science Advances. In addition to the welcome diversification in journal choices for authors looking for open access venues, there are many positive aspects of Science Advances: its broad STEM scope, its interest in cross-disciplinary research, and the offering of fee waivers. While we welcome the commitment of the Association to open access, we are also deeply concerned with the specific approach. Herein, we outline a number of suggestions that are in line with both the current direction that scholarly publishing is taking and the needs expressed by the open access community, which this journal aims to serve