A Study on Safety Profile and Clinical Outcomes of Tumor Necrosis Factor-Alpha Inhibitors in Patients with Ankylosing Spondylitis in a Tertiary Care Centre

BACKGROUND: The spondyloarthritides (SpA) comprises five subtypes: ankylosing spondylitis (AS), reactive arthritis (ReA), major parts of arthritis/spondylitis spectrum associated with psoriasis (PSO) and inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) and undifferentiated SpA (uSpA). AS is the most frequent subtype of SpA, being more prevalent than undifferentiated SpA, but psoriatic arthritis (PsA), based on the high prevalence of psoriasis, is also quite frequent, while ReA and IBD are relatively rare. The prevalence of the whole group of SpA has been recently estimated as between 0.6 and 1.9% with an implicated AS prevalence of between 0.1 and 1.1%. AIM OF THE STUDY: To study the safety profile and clinical outcomes of Tumor necrosis factor-alpha inhibitors in patients with ankylosing spondylitis in a tertiary care hospital, Chennai. MATERIALS AND METHODS: InPatients after obtaining informed consent are recruited. Laboratory tests include CBC, RFT, LFT, Mantoux, CT chest, HBsAg, Anti- HCV, HIV has done at the time of screening. In these patients are administered TNF-alpha inhibitors as per regular protocol, to determine the efficacy. RESULTS: Our study showed that mild tapering of TNFi had efficacy comparable with that of the standard-dose treatment in maintaining the optimal target in patients with axSpA who reached ASDAS-ID 1 year after TNFi treatment. Our study also shows with significant statistical values of ASDAS – ESR and BASDAI, TNF – INHIBITORS are both safe and efficacious in patients with Ankylosing spondylitis. CONCLUSION: Although this result should be confirmed with randomized studies in the future, it provides important real-world evidence for the universal recommendation of the tapering strategy

Proteomics Mass Spectrometry Methods: Chapter 8 - Sample preparation for proteomics and mass spectrometry from animal samples

Proteomics, although being actively developed and applied in a diverse range of areas including human biomedicine or plant science, has been limited in animal science. Gathering information from studies conducted on farm animal species will not only benefit the field of animal science but it will help in the understanding of the complex biological processes involved in human health and disease. Here we provide a simple and efficient protocol for proteins extraction from muscle tissue (exudate collected postmortem following centrifugation). Moreover, in this chapter we describe a Filter Aided Sample Preparation (FASP) protocol optimized for animal biological material. This method uses standard filtration device with different pore size to retain proteins with bigger size, while detergents and impurities pass through. The FASP method has been successfully employed in animal specimens for proteins purification and digestion expanding the breadth of achievable proteome coverage in animal science