Has anyone taken Otezla for their psoriasis along with a biologic? I haven’t been the most typical patient for my rheumatologist or my primary. My psoriasis is never bigger than an eraser on a pencil and comes and goes freely, however, recently I went to my primary for concerns with my toenails and she said I have nail psoriasis in my toes and it is developing in my fingers. She wanted me to start taking Otezla but I refused until I talked to my rheumatologist and a dermatologist. Considering I haven’t had the best time taking biologics because of the side effects, I am being a bit cautious about throwing another immune suppressant into the mix until it is absolutely necessary. It’s not bothering me yet, I think I will wait until it settles into my fingernails more to take any action towards it besides visiting a dermatologist in November to get their take on it. I know everybody is different, but any input is helpful.
Interesting, sstjohn. Can you remind us of what happened with your biologics? And what happened with methotrexate?
I agree with you: you need to have a good talk with your rheumatologist and your dermatologist. A couple of things to remember, though: pain control isn’t disease control, and pain isn’t a good indicator of how bad your PsA is. Like you, many of us weren’t the most typical patients! Then again, some of us were typical, but our docs didn’t recognize what they were looking at. This is one slippery fish of a disease we’ve got here.
Otezzla did nothing for my nail psoriasis. My toes on one foot are bad, but it has gotten slowly better on biologics. The toenail psoriasis was one of the give aways I had PSA.
Methotrexate was a nightmare. I turned into a zombie because of the fatigue and honestly, it made everything worse. I was out of work for a month. Humira didn’t work at all for me either, the side effects weren’t as bad, but I was allergic to it and would get a GIANT hive that lasted way too long on the injection site. I switched to the citrate free version, but I was still allergic to it and it didn’t help. I am on remicade now (max dose every 5 weeks) and it’s helping enough to get me by and that’s all I’m asking for.