From Stelara To Taltz

[JRW80]

I'm going to see the derm next week about switching to Taltz. I've been on Stelara for about 10 years (1 month after it was approved). It just doesn't seem to be as effective at my extremities. PsA in my feet is ridiculous, as is Plaques on my toes. Stelara has never done anything for my nether region.  From what I can tell Talz theoreticlly should be better in all areas, but of course I'll never know unless I try it...

Which brings me to my question about cutting over to Taltz from Stelara. There are no guidlines for this, and you can't completely wash out as you'd have to be off Stelara for like a year. I remember the rheumy wanted me to wash out of the Humira for 3 months. It's not her joints that might get permanantly damaged of course. Fortunately, it was being perscribed by a derm that didn't really care what I did, because it was so new she had position to say anything. Is there any real need to wash out or just jump right in and be ready with a Z-pack if I get sick?

Oh and nice place ya'll got here, 1st post!  

Thx,
Jay

[jiml]

Hi jay and welcome to the club I'm not on a biological drug yet so can't really be much help  but from what I understand and I could be wrong but I believe you can move seamlessly from one bio to another
I'm sure others will come and tell you the same but I'm the only Brit here at the moment as it's 3am here and I'm off to bed
Good to meet you
Good luck on taltz it will hopefully work well
Jim

[Caroline]

Hello Jay,

Welcome to psoriasisclub !
Like Jim. I have no knowledge on the quick transfer from the one biological to the next one. So I am not much of a help for you, but only thought of welcoming you..

A bit of theorising though, Taltz is aiming at a different interleukin than Stelara does. So in that sense they don’t bite. It may be that for a while there are two interleukin receptors that are blocked. What that means for the functioning of your immune system, I don’t know. I have not heard of studies researching that.

What I do know is that in the US, Texas is the US right? Doctors tend to be very careful because of the high claiming attitude in the US, so they easily may be “over”-careful.

Those were my 2 cents.
Indeed I think others will join in, we have several members who have switched from biological.

Cheers,
Caroline

[Fred]

Hello Jay, I switched from 6+ years on Stelara to Cosentyx (which is much the same as Taltz) without a break.

Over the years I have switched:

Remicade to Enbrel
Enbrel to Humira
Humira to Stelara
Stelara to Cosentyx

And the only thing I was ever told was that I had to wait till the last dose had finished it's time. So for Stelara it would be 12 weeks after your last shot before you can move over to Taltz.

Welcome to Psoriasis Club by the way.  

[D Foster]

Welcome to the club Jay .
I am on Stelara myself for nearly 6 years and as it's starting to lose it's efficacy now I have been put on to 10 weeks between the shots however they offered me Cosentyx and I understood it would just be a continuation of the treatment after the 12 weeks break.
I was on MTX before I went on the Stelara and I had to wait 12 weeks though I know that it's not a bio.
Very interesting to know you have been on Stelara for the longest time I have come across , the area that never cleared for me was my ears , I always thought that it did not help much with my PsA however after a mess was made of my last but one delivery I was 4 weeks over my injection day in fact 6 weeks really as they had just dropped it to 10 weeks and my PsA was chronic.
Have a good look around it's a great club that Fred has set up with no adverts just helpful and friendly inmates.

[JRW80]

What I do know is that in the US, Texas is the US right?   Doctors tend to be very careful because of the high claiming attitude in the US, so they easily may be “over”-careful.

We don't always like to acknowledge this, but yes   Yeah I've heard that excuse in my day, but the reality is the doctors here aren't always sure themselves of what to do, and then they get sued....so they tend not to do anything unless they have to. I assure you, I'll end up telling a Physician's assistant what we are doing, because I can't even get in to see the doctor... which is why I'm here   

And the only thing I was ever told was that I had to wait till the last dose had finished it's time. So for Stelara it would be 12 weeks after your last shot before you can move over to Taltz.

Welcome to Psoriasis Club by the way.  

Thank you! Sounds reasonable. I did a 10 week injection recently, so I may get to wait until the new year.
 

Welcome to the club Jay .

Very interesting to know you have been on Stelara for the longest time I have come across , the area that never cleared for me was my ears , I always thought that it did not help much with my PsA however after a mess was made of my last but one delivery I was 4 weeks over my injection day in fact 6 weeks really as they had just dropped it to 10 weeks and my PsA was chronic.

Thank you! There was an old message board in the US, I was able to interact with people involved with the trial on it, and could tell it was a game changer. Those are the only people that have been on it longer than me. I'm thinking September or October of 2007. Time is fun when you are having flies! It is interesting to find out that they have now tied PPP to the TNF-A blockers. That's what triggered my jump to Stelara...never even considered it was the drug. I guess I'm somewhat relieved I won't ever have to worry about that nightmare again.

Thanks all!
Jay

[Caroline]

You’re welcome Jay,

We all give our experiences and thoughts in order to try to help each other.
Wish you a good transfer to Taltz.
And we also would like it, if you told us after the change how you are doing. All experiences can be valuable for the ones following.


Caroline

[Imapsomom]

Hi Jay, welcome! Exciting to hear you have been on Stelara for 10 years. My 14 year old is about to start. I hope he has similar success as you. Good luck with the Taltz. I hope you get 10 + out of that!

[Turnedlight]

Hi Jay nice to meet you

I switched from Stelara to Taltz earlier this year, I cant remember how long between them, but it was only a couple of months I think. It didn’t really work for me so I’ve just switched back to Humira and I only had to wait a month for that.

This is about how long it takes the derm to switch as well because under the NHS she has to apply for the funding each time because they’re such expensive drugs.
Having said that of course this is only my experience and you need to take your own docs advice.

Well done for ten years though, Stelara was fab but I only got less than a year before it stopped working.

[JRW80]

Change in game plan. After investigating a little bit more, I decided I'd like to see what Tremfya does next. I wasn't really aware that their trial data doubled the response over Stelara. It has been in development forever. I remember it being talked about as CNTO-1959 since before the Stelara trials were over. It is in fact the follow up drug to Stelara developed by the same company and personnel. The trial data looked very similar to Taltz, which makes sense as they are both doing similar things. Taltz's trial had some things in it that changed my mind, and it was backed up when I went to see the Physician's assistant. She likes Tremfya better, but said it wasn't approved for PsA yet...I was like no surprise there, neither was Stelara when I got on it. It took the Rheumy's another 4 years and their own trial to get on board (and people wonder why the drugs are so expensive). Of course the data is out there that it doubled the response over Stelara for PsA too. I think at this point, it's just ever so slightly lower risk to try Tremfya given my success with Stelara before moving to a different IL target.

I should be ready to start at the end of January. We'll see how it goes!

Jay